Art Review: Chris Kraus

Stefanie Hessler writes about Chris Kraus and her show FILMS BEFORE AND AFTER at Index, in Art Review

“Are we going to have to kill him?” “I hope not here.” The dialogues in Chris Kraus’s films, such as this exchange from Sadness at Leaving (1992) – an adaptation of Erje Ayden’s pulp spy novel from 1989 – are piercing. The acting is heightened in a way that makes the characters feel slightly off. Self-conscious and often self- deprecating awkwardness is a key ingredient in Kraus’s writing and her moving-image oeuvre, evoked in the latter by alienated dramaturgy, theatrical sound effects and harsh cuts.”

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