Limits of Vision

WRITER/DIRECTOR: Laura Harrison
PRODUCER: Eugene Sun Park 
GENRE: Animation
FORMAT: Feature Film                                                                                                              
STATUS: Production

SYNOPSIS

The Limits of Vision is a period piece featuring a "mad" housewife, Marcia, a twenty-something South Londonite, whose whimsical notions about dust and dirt take a dark turn when she hosts coffee morning. It's a story about art, metaphysics, obsessive compulsion and second wave feminism. Told through a fascinating character, an ingenious but profoundly conflicted individual, who comes unstuck amid the transformation of gender rules in 1970s suburban London. With cameo appearances by Charles Darwin, Pieter De Hooch and Pierrie Tielhard De Chardin.

ARTIST STATEMENT

I want to investigate the state of mind of women in the early seventies, when they were entering the work force in classically male domains. I was already in the process of adapting The Limits of Vision, written by Robert Irwin, during the 2016 election. Struck by the backlash against Hilary Clinton, I recommitted to the project and tried to view it through the lens of our current ambivalence about white feminism. I was also intrigued by the book’s subtext of mortality and the metaphysics of non attachment, with dirt and dust the visible signs of our inevitable decay. To me, it spoke to our current preoccupation with purity on both the right and the left. Written in 1985, it is fascinating to see how applicable it is today. Because Irwin does such a good job creating a sympathetic character in the housewife Marcia, he makes the case for empathetic forays into otherness. Irwin converted to Islam in the late sixties and was himself a house husband in the early seventies. 

About the creator

LAURA HARRISON lives and works in Chicago. Her animations focus on marginalized, social outcasts with their own sub cultures. These fringe characters provide a focal point for her concerns with diaspora, trans humanism, gender and the loss of touch in an overwhelmingly visual world. Her films have shown at various festivals internationally including The New York Film Festival, Ottowa International Animation Festival, Animafest Zagreb, LA Film Festival, The Chicago Underground Film Festival, Kerry Film Festival, Japan Media Arts Festival, Boston International Film Festival, Florida Film Festival, GLAS, Melbourne International Animation Festival and many others.