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BLISS.JPG

Emily Rose Apter, Elijah Stevens
USA, 2023
9 min.

A travelogue through the familiar and unfamiliar terrain of digital landscapes. Pairing 16mm footage of computer desktop backgrounds with soundscapes of sites of technological extraction –  precious metal mining, smelting foundries, microprocessing plants, and data farms – Bliss.jpg excavates and examines the geological and geographical sites that produce our virtual worlds.

In the year 2000, an American photographer receives $100 000 from Microsoft in exchange for the rights to one of his photographs. The image would later become the memorable desktop background of billions of computers worldwide. There’s certainly something unsettling about exploring such a familiar image in detail. Just like an optical illusion, Bliss.jpg takes us, pixel by pixel, through the familiar screensavers of a digital world that has almost become ancient. The film investigates these images with meticulousness and with an awareness that beyond them lies nothing. Yet there is something indescribable that magnetically pulls in the directors’ film camera, an almighty force akin to a black hole. (Emil Vasilache)

Data proiecție și locație

Wednesday, 27th of September | 18:00

Cinemateca Eforie, Strada Eforie 2
Cumpără bilet

Emily Rose Apter

Emily Rose Apter is a curator and filmmaker based in Brooklyn, NY. She works as the Co-Director of Programming at the Maysles Documentary Center, a nonprofit microcinema and education center founded by Albert Maysles. Emily has programmed at cinemas, museums, and schools around the country including Spectacle Theater, Peephole Cinema, Museum of the City of NY, City College, Harlem Stage, and the Film-Makers’ Cooperative, among others. Her writing has appeared in Millennium Film Journal, Analog Cookbook, and Screen Slate. Archives, cultural production, labor, landscapes, and collective struggle are core themes of her work.

Elijah Stevens

Elijah Stevens is a filmmaker and documentary producer based in Brooklyn, NY. He most recently associate-produced Hollywoodgate (Venice 2023), King Coal (Sundance 2023), Fire of Love (Sundance 2022; Academy Award nominee for Documentary Feature 2023) and co-produced The Invisible Extinction (CPH:DOX 2022). His work has been supported by Sundance, DOK Leipzig, The Gotham, DocsBarcelona, DOC NYC, DOK.Forum, and Ji.hlava, amongst others. Elijah was a 2019-2020 fellow in the UnionDocs Collaborative Studio. His work explores migration, technology, geography, and the capitalocene.

  • Technical sheet
  • Production and distribution
  • DIRECTED, SHOT & EDITED BY: Emily Apter & Elijah Stevens
  • SOUND MIX: Andrew Oedel
  • COLOR CORRECTION: Sean Hanley
  • FILM PROCESSING: Mono No Aware
  • TITLES: Negativeland
  • PRODUCED BY: Emily Rose Apter & Elijah Stevens

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BLISS.JPG

Emily Rose Apter, Elijah Stevens | Duration 9 min.

A travelogue through the familiar and unfamiliar terrain of digital landscapes. Pairing 16mm footage of computer desktop backgrounds with soundscapes of sites of technological extraction – precious metal mining, smelting foundries, microprocessing plants, and data farms – Bliss.jpg excavates and examines the geological and geographical sites that produce our virtual worlds.

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