Picture Perfect

How do we look at a concept as rigid and fluid as femininity — or masculinity? What are the sources of their representation on screen, be it abbreviations and clichés, carefully controlled images, cheeky touches, or radical ruptures that come from the depths of the need for self-determination? In a register that is as playful as it is serious, humorous and analytical, Picture Perfect proposes a thorough analysis of how gender roles and gender identity are represented, whether we are looking at stereotypes or at images and narratives that break them (in every sense of the word) through the reins of self-representation. In this ballet of themes — motherhood and abortion, nuclear families and feminism — there are films that slip in with the agility and sensuality of an acrobat, offering both a satirical and comprehensive look at sexuality, hiding between the movements of frenzied dances of both heterosexual and queer bodies a broader analysis of racialized identities. This programme undertakes a multi-layered portrait of gender representation as it is today and as it once were — running the gamut from prototypes shot on film reels to the visual Babylon of the digital world, passing through the abstract, the textual, the graphic and photographic. (Flavia Dima)