The Colorado Premiere of Imber’s Left Hand, a new documentary about artist Jon Imber’s heroic battle with ALS, will take place Saturday, November 15, 2014 at 7pm at the Starz Denver Film Festival, screening at the Sie FilmCenter, 2510 East Colfax, Denver, CO. Two more screenings are scheduled: November 16 at 9pm, and November 17 at 2pm, also at the Sie FilmCenter. Directed by Richard Kane, Imber’s Left Hand (2014, 74 min) is a “deeply moving story” (Maine Sunday Telegram) of two artists faced with one’s death and how art and love give them the reasons to live. According to Kane: “I was given the extraordinary privilege of witnessing two lovers grappling with how to squeeze the most out of each moment of life. What a gift Jon Imber and Jill Hoy have left us with.” In a front page review in the Boston Globe, art critic Sebastian Smee wrote, “this beautiful film … takes the wind out of you. (its) about more than the legacy of a painter. ... in the end … this was a film ... about love.” Art critic Edgar Allen Beem called it “A Great Triumph!” In the summer of 2012, painter Jon Imber was diagnosed with ALS. Imber’s Left Hand tells the story of this artist’s courageous and darkly humorous response to such a sentence. The film traces his adaptations, switching from painting with his right hand to his left, and then to both hands as the condition worsens. Adversity only makes him more determined to paint -- more than 100 portraits in a three-month span. In the film we first encounter Imber in his Somerville, Massachusetts studio. He and his partner, painter Jill Hoy, analyze a self-portrait and talk about the anxiety and terror to come. The painting becomes an unsettling metaphor of Imber’s psychological journey living into his dying through his art.
Posted on: Thu, 13 Nov 2014 18:48:10 +0000