An Evening with Suzan Pitt

This caricature of Suzan Pitt accompanied my 1979 FUNNYWORLD profile of her, linked below.

Last night, a full house at MoMA greeted renowned independent experimental filmmaker/animator Suzan Pitt. An Evening with Suzan Pitt was part of MoMa’s Modern Mondays series, as well as a major event of To Save and Project: The 14th MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation.

The selected screening included Pitt’s dazzling, hand-drawn-and-painted masterworks Crocus (1971), Asparagus (1979), and Joy Street (1995), which she rightfully claimed as “major works of mine.” She also screened two recent films – Visitation (2011) and Pinball (2013); all five films have recently been beautifully restored by the Academy Film Archive.

The films’ sensuality, the intriguing explorations of sex, joy and depression, the detailed painterly visions alternately nightmarish and sinister, exuberant and manic, bowled over the audience, who clearly savored the opportunity to see these films projected on a theater screen.

Post-screening, Suzan received a standing ovation from both young people new to her work, and members of the New York film community long familiar with it. “I can count on one hand that happening in my years at MoMA,” MoMA film curator/programmer Josh Siegel said, “the last time was for Jeanne Moreau.” Pitt, now 73, then discussed her work with articulate passion, in conversation with Siegel.

For those who were not fortunate enough to attend the evening, she also discusses her work and techniques in this informative 2006 documentary, Persistence of Vision, by Blue Kraning and Laura Kraning:

Among the audience were video maker and veteran media arts curator Kathy Brew, and a number of Pitt’s contemporaries among the New York independent animation filmmakers who began making personal shorts in the 1970s and 80s, including George Griffin, Lisa Crafts, and myself.

Fashion designer Patricia Field, left, and Suzan Pitt, each wearing one of Pitt’s hand-painted silk coats.

Also attending was Patricia Field, legendary fashion designer who sells made-to order clothing and accessories created by artists, including gorgeous one-of-a-kind hand-painted coats by Suzan Pitt. She calls them “animation walk-abouts.” Both Pitt and Field wore them last night and they are terrific. Click here for more information.

I first encountered Suzan’s work at a screening in the 1970s at the Whitney Museum. I wrote about her and her early films, including Asparagus, in Michael Barrier’s Funnyworld magazine #21 (Fall 1979). You can read the article here.

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