Wednesday, December 8, 7 pm @ Hallwalls Contemporary Art Center and online
Pre-screening reception with catering at 6 pm
Free and open to the public
Get tickets for the online screening below

Squeaky Wheel is excited to be a co-presenter of the screening of Sharlene Bamboat’s feature length hybrid-documentary, If From Every Tongue it Drips. The film that follows a queer Urdu poet as she traces the connections between quantum physics and political movements in South Asia. The filmmaker will be present for a Q&A with Squeaky Wheel curator Ekrem Serdar. This event is presented by the Humanities Institute/Distinguished Visiting Scholars Program Film Series at the University at Buffalo, and is screened as part of Squeaky Wheel’s event series [Speaking in Foreign Language].

In-person attendees: The event will take place at 341 Delaware Ave, Buffalo, NY 14202. A catered pre-screening reception will begin at 6 pm.

Online attendees: Upon check-out, you will receive an email titled “Your Squeaky Wheel Film & Media Art Center order has been received!”. A private link will be included in that email; the event will be available at the link at the start date and time. You will have access to the event for 24 hours; Squeaky Wheel members receive 72 hour access. Not a member yet? Sign up here.

Sharlene Bamboat, If From Every Tongue it Drips, 68 min, Canada, Sri Lanka, Scotland, 2021

If From Every Tongue it Drips is a hybrid documentary film that uses the framework of quantum physics to explore the ways that personal relationships and political movements at once transcend and challenge time, space, identity and location.

The film follows the lives of a couple living in Batticaloa, Sri Lanka; Ponni writes Rekhti, a form of 19th century, Urdu, queer poetry; the other, Sarala, the camera operator. As their personal lives unfold on camera, the lines between rehearsal and reality, location and distance, self and other dissipate and reinforce one another.

Simultaneously, through poet and camera operator’s daily lives, interconnections between British colonialism, Indian nationalism and the impact of both on contemporary poetry, dance and music in South Asia is revealed.

The film explores both literal and figural translation as multiple ways of looking, embedded within the filmmaking process, which was all conducted long distance. The scenes were constructed in Montreal, where Sharlene sent informal instructions to Sarala, who then filmed Ponni, who would then send the footage back to Montreal, from which the next scene was written. This process continued for 6 months on a weekly basis, after which most of the film was constructed. The sound was constructed between Montreal, Batticaloa and the Isle of Skye, where the sound designer Richy Carey resides. The film incorporates the sonic sphere of all three locations, enhancing notions of quantum entanglement which are employed throughout the filmic process, to showcase the interconnections between location, geography, self and other which continue to be intertwined.

This film nods to Sharlene’s ongoing interest in both the many ways that popular culture can be politicised, as well as the sensuous possibilities of its reclamation.

Biography of the filmmaker

Sharlene Bamboat is a moving image and installation artist based in Tiohtià:ke/Montreal. Her practice engages with translation, history, and sound to uncover sensory and fractured ways of understanding the relationship between the self and the social in transnational contexts.

Her works examine the role of colonialism, globalization, culture, and desire through poetics, abstraction, and collaboration by working with artists, musicians and writers to animate historical, political, legal, and pop-culture materials. Her most frequent collaborator, since 2009, is Alexis Mitchell. In addition to her art practice, Sharlene works in the arts-sector, including artist-run organizations and collectives in Canada, and with artists both locally and internationally.

Banner image description: A still from If From Every Tongue It Drips by Sharlene Bamboat. A person sits on a wooden rocking chair in a bright orange room sunshine spilling in. The person in the chair is half out of frame arms holding a piece of paper. Yellow caption on screen reads: “hence, matter is an infolding, an in-volution. hmmmmmmmmmmm”. Image and description courtesy of the artist.