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 I make film to cultivate a more participatory relationship with the animate world, and build community through live, conscious dialogue. My early body of experimental film employs organic, photochemical, and direct manipulation techniques, and my recent projects are poetic documentaries that weave personal and political narratives into natural and urban landscapes. My arts practice synergizes personal expression and formal experimentation with theoretical inquiry and social responsibility. I aspire to make work that is both creative and critical—a sensual intelligence that speaks to the mind through the heart.
I’m interested in the capacity of the camera frame to direct our attention in terms of what and how we see; the presence of human gesture made manifest through the flickering tactility of cinema; and the challenge to retain the texture of that gesture in the realm of one's and zero's. How can we trust our own eyes in these technocratic times when pictures are as easily produced and reproduced as they are disposed of? What does it mean to be authentic when our experience of the world is increasingly virtual? How can we ground ourselves in a culture of distractions mediated by an ever-shifting media landscape?
I strive to answer these questions through my art/work, and serve the world as an agent of direct change—as a mindful visionary—and establish new paradigms for participation through what Paoulo Freire referred to as "informed action." For me, the process of filmmaking and the search for consciousness are interdependent endeavors. I make film, not only to 'take pictures', but to connect more deeply to my subject, my self, my community—and the big picture.
Bio
Ken Paul Rosenthal is an independent filmmaker, teacher and activist. He is the recipient of a SAMSHA Voice Award for his media work in mental health advocacy, and a Kodak Award for Cinematography. Ken holds an MA in Creative & Interdisciplinary Arts, and an MFA in Cinema Production. He has conducted over 100 hand-processing workshops, curated four programs of hand-made film called Texture of the Gesture, and taught film as a means of cultivating personal vision in workshops and universities in North America and abroad. His early work is available for rental as 16mm prints through Canyon Cinema.
Rosenthal's recently completed social justice documentary, Crooked Beauty explores a new healing culture and political model for living with madness as a tool of creativity, inspiration and hope. He continues to present Crooked Beauty screening lectures and workshops in peer support networks, hospitals, universities, art schools, symposia, and jails worldwide. His current in-progress project, Courting Gesture (c.2011), explores the nature of touch in the digital age.
Selected Awards
SAMHSA Voice Award, 2011
Award of Merit — University Film & Video Association 2011
Grand Prize, Best Documentary Short — US Film & Digital Video Festival, 2011
Best Documentary Short — Mendocino Film Festival, 2011
Second Prize Documentary Short — Athens International Film & Video Festival, 2011
Best First Person Narrative — Scottish Mental Health Arts & Film Festival, 2011
Best Short, Artivist Spirit — Artivist Film Festival, 2011
Award of Merit — Superfest International Disability Film Festival, 2011
Best of Fest and Audience Choice Award — Szeged Super 8 Film Festival, 2010
Best of Fest — Human Dignity Film Festival, 2010
Bay Area Documentary Fund Grant — The San Francisco Foundation, 2009
Director’s Citation — Black Maria Film Festival, 2007
John Gutmann Award for Experimental Film — San Francisco State University, 2006
Leo Diner Award for Innovative Filmmaking — San Francisco State University, 2005
Kodak Cinematography Award and Rosebud Award — CSU Media Arts Festival, 2004
Mission Arts Foundation Residency — Arts Explosion, San Francisco, 2004
Film Arts Foundation Award — Humboldt International Film Festival, 2002
Jury Award Experimental Process — Ann Arbor Film Festival, 1996
Sobel Memorial National Scholarship — San Francisco Art Institute, 1988
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