Curated by Antje Ehmann and Harun Farocki

About Labor in a Single Shot:

The camera behind film history’s first movie was pointed at a factory. Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory, shot in 1895 by Auguste and Louis Lumière, shows men and women as they leave the gate of the Lumière factory in Lyon, France. Typical of early nineteenth century films, this film was made in one continuous shot, a technique that emphasizes the idea that every detail of the moving world is worth considering and capturing. For their project Labor in a Single Shot, Antje Ehmann and Harun Farocki returned to the methods of the Lumière brothers, inviting filmmakers and art and film students worldwide to express the subject of “work” with a single camera shot.

BCA is proud to host the United States premiere of Labor in a Single Shot. The exhibition includes films by filmmakers who worked with Ehmann and Farocki during their October 2013 workshop at MIT. Boston-area subject matter includes ticket scalpers at Fenway Park, a neighborhood honey vendor and professional Cos Play workers among others. With America’s unemployment rate at over six percent, the investigation of labor in all forms – paid, unpaid, material, immaterial, traditional, innovative, rural or urban – is at the forefront of the media landscape.