In ‘The African Desperate‘, filmmaker Martine Syms pokes fun at the art world

At just 34, Martine Syms has carved out a prominent place for herself in the world of contemporary art. Represented by London gallery Sadie Coles HQ, the Los Angeles native, who has shown at both MoMA and the Art Institute of Chicago, uses a variety of formats to write both personal and collective myths: monumental photo collages inspired by her own life story, sitcom parodies mixing web culture and cultural theory, intimate portraits of her friends and relatives, not to mention a podcast that she hosts. Lacking in neither versatility nor ambition, Syms is overflowing with ideas about how to address questions of desire, identity, gender, race and community.

 

The author of several videos for Prada and Nike, she has achieved international recognition for her moving-image work, and, at this April’s New Directors Festival, premièred her début feature film The African Desperate. Entirely self-produced, the movie draws inspiration from Syms’s personal experience in the art world as it follows student Palace Bryant during the 24 hours after her graduation from art school. From odd encounters with strange neurotic characters to wild parties in New York and Chicago, Syms depicts an artistic milieu of snobbery, pretensiousness, superficiality and hysterical bloated egos through which her character moves with ever growing dismay. Frantic and engaging, it crackles with all the sharp humour for which Syms is famed. For Numéro art, photographer Danielle Levitt shot Syms’s artistic family in Los Angeles, a community – a term that, in the context of her work, takes on all its full meaning – of 12 people who inspire and sometimes contribute to her projects, among them singers, actors, writers and relatives, such as her niece and her brother.

 

 

MOCA Artist Film Series: Martine Syms⁠, The African Desperate (2022) 97 min.⁠ Thursday, March 16, 2023, 6pm⁠. MOCA Grand Avenue⁠. Free with RSVP⁠