Zoe Beloff: Book Launch & Double Bill
When:
—
Venue:
Birkbeck 43 Gordon Square
Zoe Beloff: Book Launch & Double Bill
Friday 23 October, 18:30-21:00
Birkbeck Cinema, 43 Gordon Square
Join us for the launch of Zoe Beloff's new book Life Forgotten, paired with a double bill of two films that circle each other like distant planets. Each one a meditation on immigrant community, memory and New York's Lower East Side, and each asking: how can everyday art bring people together?
LIFE FORGOTTEN (2026, 50mins)
Set in New York's Lower East Side in the early twentieth century, the film centres on a real storefront cinema, Frank Seiden's Variety Theater, where silent movies were anything but. Frank and his sons improvised dialogue and sang Yiddish ballads to an audience that didn't hesitate to join in or argue back. It was a welcoming space for women, and the film follows a group of radical young garment workers who gather here to figure out how to fight for their rights and change their world. This film is a companion to the book.
JOSEPHINE THE SINGER, OR THE MOUSE PEOPLE (2026, 35mins)
A work of remembrance. One by one, the community that is the Mouse People recite the text of Franz Kafka's short story in quiet places across the Lower East Side. Josephine's story is presented as something transmitted across time — summoned mysteriously, at the edge of consciousness, from inside the body of an oppressed people. Why was it that her voice so captivated them?
Zoe Beloff will be present to discuss the films and her new book, in conversation with Prof. Ian Christie.
Contact name: Matthew Barrington
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