"Watching the Leaves Age As I Do the Same" (2021) by Gabby Sumney
Video still images from“Watching the Leaves Age As I Do the Same” by Gabby Sumney, a meditation on aging with a chronic illness using a year of 16mm footage and hand-painted film.
Gabby Sumney (née Follett) is an Afro-Latinx, queer, nonbinary nonfiction filmmaker with a disability based in Boston, Massachusetts. They work in experimental nonfiction with a special emphasis on issues of identity and personal narrative. Their work has screened at curated screenings and festivals across the US and Europe including Alchemy Film and Moving Image Festival, Indie Grits, and Fracto Film Encounter. Gabby is also the creator of This Week in Experimental, a weekly newsletter that features links to experimental films & videos, reading suggestions, and optional assignments. Gabby has recently received the LEF grant.
Trans Experimental, a group exhibition of experimental film and animation by trans artists in the greater Boston area, launches at The Sidewalk Video Gallery on February 14, 2021. The show, organized by Boston LGBTQIA+ Artist Alliance (BLAA), introduces a new artist each week. Experimental film deals with perception and abstraction and uses non-commercial techniques including photochemical abstraction, hand-painted animation, digital glitch work, and found footage collage. In this show, trans artists explore and find solace in practices of experimental film that are based on the re-collage, the tactical, the degradation, and the reclamation. Each work lends itself to reflection on the trans body and identity.