Shorts Program: Captive Feast

With filmmakers Theo Jean Cuthand and Gernot Wieland in person 

This selection of films highlights the role of art in counteracting experiences of isolation and alienation for those struggling with mental illness inside and outside of psychiatric institutions. 

Captive Feast (“La fête prisonnière”) 
Dir. Mario Ruspoli. 1962, 17 mins. Inmates of the psychiatric hospital at Saint-Alban celebrate the annual village festival with the rest of the town in Ruspoli’s respectful, attentive documentary. 

Bird in Italian Is Ucello 
Dir. Gernot Wieland. 2021, 14 mins. Inspired by a never-performed production of Daphne du Maurier’s The Birds at an Italian psychiatric hospital, Wieland’s film is an unfixed and unreliable tale that ruminates on states of mind, social belonging, and the limits of psychoanalysis. 

Abandoned Goods 
Dir. Pia Borg. 2014, 36 mins. This meditative essay film tells the story of the rediscovered Adamson Collection, a body of work created between 1946 and 1981 by patients of a psychiatric hospital in Surrey, Great Britain. 

Love & Numbers 
Dir. Theo Jean Cuthand. 2014, 8 mins. Made after the artist’s hospitalization for bipolar disorder, this film attempts to make sense of love, global paranoia, and colonial trauma.  

Tickets: $15 / $11 senior and students / $9 youth (ages 3–17) / free for MoMI members at the Senior/Student level and above. There is a $1.50 transaction fee per ticket for all online purchases. The cost of admission may be applied toward a same-day purchase of a membership. 

Order tickets. Please pick up tickets at the Museum’s admissions desk upon arrival. All seating is general admission.