A month of single frames

14 MINUTES

An artist captures the joys of solitude amid a month living in a beach shack

‘I am overwhelmed by simplicity. There is so much to see.’

In 1998, the pioneering US feminist artist Barbara Hammer (1939-2019) spent a month at an artist residency in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Feeling ‘compelled to do absolutely nothing’ while living in a dune shack without running water or electricity, Hammer documented her solitude with a journal, a tape recorder and a 16 mm film camera. For decades, these materials remained in her personal archive, until, as Hammer was nearing the end of her life in 2018, she entrusted her friend, the celebrated US filmmaker Lynne Sachs, to craft a film with the materials.

For the project, Sachs recorded Hammer reading from her decades-old journals during her final months. Hammer, who is known for her provocative and often controversial artworks, here provides a widely accessible yet distinctive account of solitude, beauty and where these two experiences met during her month on the beach. Her intimate, diaristic account is accompanied by gorgeous nature shots in which she plays with filters and frame rates, seemingly with no other motive than creative exploration. And, connecting past and present through her editing, including the use of words on the screen, Sachs’s treatment provides Hammer’s experience a delicate narrative structure.

In one sense, A Month of Single Frames is a touching coda to Hammer’s life, as the film concludes with the artist revisiting her own poignant meditations on mortality. But, percolating just beneath the surface is a more expansive celebration of artistry, and the artist’s ability to observe, contemplate, refract and give new contours to the world.

Director: Lynne Sachs

Explore more

Black and white photo of a hand holding a scallop shell. The background is blurred and the shell shows detailed texture.

A poetic, sea-soaked tribute to the ‘cockle women’ of Wales

Directed by Lily Tiger

Two silhouetted people stand against a dramatic orange and purple sunset sky.

In the outback, a town of two awaits visitors to their emergency airport

Directed by Yannick Jamey

A still from the film Miss Congeniality showing the actress Sandra Bullock in a tight-fitting lilac dress walking towards the camera, surrounded by people in pink uniforms.
FILM

From drab to fab – a playful dissection of the Hollywood makeover

Directed by Sue Ding

A large flock of birds fills the sky at dusk over a car park, where people with binoculars observe them from beside their vehicles.
PLACE

A makeshift community of people and migratory birds converge on a strip mall

Directed by Henry Davis

A cluttered room filled with stacks of books and papers, with a ginger cat lounging on a yellow chair in the centre.
PLACE

The clutter of a used bookshop forms an evocative metaphor for memory

Directed by Diego Quinderé de Carvalho

Illustration of cupped hands holding a golden artefact with intricate patterns against a textured background.

A Bronze Age pendant links lives centuries apart in this wondrous short

Directed by Samantha Moore

A man with glasses inspects a detailed model featuring a car, a bridge, and two figures inside a miniature building.
HOME

After leaving Damascus, Mohamad longs for a home that no longer exists

Directed by Jimmy Goldblum

Ancient petroglyph depicting a human-like figure with outstretched arms and legs, etched onto a brown, weathered rock surface.

Explore the rugged beauty of Nine Mile Canyon, the world’s longest art gallery

Directed by Dane Christensen