鬼鎮 (Ghosttown)
鬼鎮 (Ghosttown) is a Glitch Western, an experimental feature film, starring: Siera Begaye, indigenous artist, actress, and activist from the Diné (Navajo) Nation, in a nonfiction aspect set in the present; and two fictional characters, a lone cowgirl making her way out West across the American imagination and an ancient Chinese deity, Girl from Gold Mountain, a warrior goddess dreamed into existence by Chinese immigrants building the transcontinental railroad, in the 1800s. Amy Beste, Curator of Conversations At the Edge, writes that "The Cowgirl journeys toward a hallucinatory ghost town, the Girl from Gold Mountain embarks on a mission to collect the bones of her believers, and Begaye sets a new course for the future. 鬼鎮 (Ghosttown) disrupts the Western's most pernicious tropes with glitches and noise, connecting yesterday’s traumas and technologies to those of today." independent film curator Patrick Friel writes that "Ghosttown as a whole is a provoking and visually striking reworking of the Western form, infusing it with a more inclusive sensibility and a contemporary, digital/computer-centric aesthetic." Art Historian and scholar Hannah Higgins calls 鬼鎮 (Ghosttown) simultaneously both "horrible and beautiful".
~ Jon Cates
2019
film, glitch western, experimental narrative
color/sound
produced with Jon Cates
* I served as lead interactive designer and 3D artist for computer generated environments.鬼鎮 (Ghosttown) is a Glitch Western, an experimental feature film, starring: Siera Begaye, indigenous artist, actress, and activist from the Diné (Navajo) Nation, in a nonfiction aspect set in the present; and two fictional characters, a lone cowgirl making her way out West across the American imagination and an ancient Chinese deity, Girl from Gold Mountain, a warrior goddess dreamed into existence by Chinese immigrants building the transcontinental railroad, in the 1800s. Amy Beste, Curator of Conversations At the Edge, writes that "The Cowgirl journeys toward a hallucinatory ghost town, the Girl from Gold Mountain embarks on a mission to collect the bones of her believers, and Begaye sets a new course for the future. 鬼鎮 (Ghosttown) disrupts the Western's most pernicious tropes with glitches and noise, connecting yesterday’s traumas and technologies to those of today." independent film curator Patrick Friel writes that "Ghosttown as a whole is a provoking and visually striking reworking of the Western form, infusing it with a more inclusive sensibility and a contemporary, digital/computer-centric aesthetic." Art Historian and scholar Hannah Higgins calls 鬼鎮 (Ghosttown) simultaneously both "horrible and beautiful".
~ Jon Cates
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