Have Matthew Barney Review Your Video

Shooting People, a web site for independent filmmakers, is running a contest during the month of October. Members (membership is $40 for the year) can post films/videos to the web site. At the end of October, the three films with the highest ratings will be forwarded to Matthew Barney for a personal review. More information is available here.

Guardian of the Veil Screening in Manchester, UK

Matthew Barney's Guardian of the Veil, (which was filmed during a live performance at the Manchester Opera House in 2007) will be screened as part of the Supersonic Festival in Manchester, England from October 22 - 24. This is the first segment of Barney's seven-part Ancient Evenings series (the second part, Ren, was filmed in Los Angeles in 2008; the third segment, Khu, is currently being produced in Detroit), based on a book by Norman Mailer about ancient Egyptian death rites.

The Supersonic Festival states that this is the first time Guardian of the Veil will be publicly projected. However, New Yorkers can watch the video (on a monitor) in the Greater New York exhibition at PS1 through October 18.

Matthew Barney "Khu" Film Shoot in Detroit October 2

The Detroit Free Press writes that Matthew Barney will be filming a live performance "reportedly" involving a barge on the Detroit and Rouge rivers. The performance will take place in front of, "a couple of hundred people handpicked by Barney ... on an afternoon and evening outing," on the rivers. Although he has been secretive about the performance, Barney "offered some hints when he spoke before a capacity crowd at the Detroit Film Theatre in January. He compared Detroit to an archaeological dig site where, courtesy of years of devastation and neglect, all the layers of the city's history are laid bare. Barney also acknowledged that Ancient Evenings is a sequel of sorts to the Cremaster films. The new film calls for the 1967 Chrysler Imperial in Cremaster 3 to evolve into a 1979 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am and plunge off the Belle Isle Bridge and into the Detroit River. The stunt, reportedly already staged by Barney, is possibly a reference to Houdini's career-defining leaps from that same bridge in the early 1900s." The Free Press also reports that Barney's adaptation of Norman Mailer's Ancient Evenings came at the novelist's request (Mailer starred as Harry Houdini in Cremaster 2) shortly before his death in 2007.

Matthew Barney Live in Detroit September 15

We've received confirmation that Matthew Barney will introduce the screening of Cremaster 4 and Cremaster 1 (they're screening the films in the order they were made) at the Detroit Institute of Arts at 7 PM on September 15. Prior to the screening, there will be a cocktail reception with Matthew Barney at 6 PM - tickets are available for $125 (partly tax-deductible). The DIA screenings will continue with Cremaster 2 and Cremaster 5 on September 22 and Cremaster 3 on September 29. To order tickets for the reception with Barney on September 15, contact Tarya Stanford at 313-833-4020 or tstanford@dia.org.

Matthew Barney Takes The Physical Challenge

Those of you who grew up in the 80's (like us at CremasterFanatic.com) may enjoy this video by Evan Smith featuring a clip from Matthew Barney's Drawing Restraint 2 backed by the music from the Nickelodeon game show Double Dare.