Statement
Sliding Off the Edge of the World, 1996My work ranges from abstract hand-manipulated pieces to work that involves found footage, to feature length improvised narratives. Each film attempts to investigate new terrain, and avoids being confined by a specific look or mood.
I like to work the surface of film to create rich visuals which I shape in a very intuitive, personal way. Since I started making films in 1983 I’ve always gone back to painting, bleaching and marking frames one by one; I’m exhilarated by this tactile relationship with film material. I like the way these abstract films (Winterwheat, Echo Anthem, Missing Something Somewhere, Blue Movie, Sweep, Guiding Fictions, Sliding off the Edge of the World) allow the viewer to be drawn into unfamiliar worlds.
Other films (Lilting Towards Chaos, Excursions, Why Live Here?) paint portraits of characters wrestling with their alienation from place. These films juxtapose narration and imagery so that the viewer is challenged to pick up the pieces. The films flutter between states, combining elements of fiction writing, diary, travelogue, landscape photography and documentary.
I’ve also made two feature length videotapes, At Home and Asea 2002 and Rockaway 2005. These two works also start with place and consider fictional characters’s relationships to where they live. In both cases I explored the locales first (Baltimore and a Queens, NY neighborhood, respectively) and then figured out how I wanted the actors to improvise material that gave voice to tensions I found inherent in these settings.
My interests in film and videomaking are restless and peripatetic. I’ve made films about the American flag, soft-core pornography, a Brooklyn walk, a trip to Mexico, day-to-day life in Tampa, Florida and three high school girls celebrating their graduation. Each new project sends me spinning in a new direction. Because I reject the constraints of traditional production values and develop my own process for each new film, any subject seems possible.
I teach film and videomaking in the Visual Arts Department at Fordham College Lincoln Center and live with filmmaker Lynne Sachs and our two children, Maya and Noa in Brooklyn, NY.
“…confronting notions of home and community in an age of unprecedented transience and instability.” – SF Cinematheque
” … a cartographer of interior landscapes forged from film chemistry, optically printed materials, documentary/diary footage and journal entries.” – LA Filmforum
” Provocative…engaging…Street leaves us with the very real sense that you take your possibilities and limitations with you wherever you go.” – Los Angeles Times
” a sweet and powerful look into the future of narrative cinema. Considering the current trend of exploring the documentary nature of scripted film (Street) is in the right place at the right time. Look for him in the future.” – Ron Wilkinson, MonstersandCritics.com
Screenings: Museum of Modern Art, NY, Whitney Museum, Toronto Film Festival, New York Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, London Film Festival, Festival du Cinema Nouveau, Montreal, Oberhausen Film Festival, Viennale International Film Festival, Vienna,VIPER Film Festival, Zurich, European Media Arts Festival, Pacific Film Archive, SF Cinematheque, San Francisco International Film Festival, NY Underground Film Festival, Reel NY, CH 13 WNET NY, Ann Arbor Film Festival, Black Maria Film Festival, Wisconsin Film Festival.