Gut Renovation

In 1989, together with a group of female friends, Su Friedrich rented and renovated an old loft in Williamsburg, an unassuming working-class district of Brooklyn. In 2005 this former industrial zone was designated a residential area and the factories,manufacturers and artists' lofts were priced out by property speculators lured by tax breaks. Friedrich spent five years documenting with her camera the changes in the area between East River and the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. She shows the demolition of industrial buildings and the construction of trendy new apartments forwealthy clients, watching old tenants leave and new inhabitants arrive. As she keeps meticulous record of developments, the extent and speed of the upheaval becomes clear. Her own tenancy agreement is up too and so her documentary images and trenchant commentary become the tools of her growing anger. A documentary of small changes evolves into an historical record of New York. The resulting film is a melancholy, essayistic requiem for a neighbourhood and an entire way of life; it also provides a case study of the rapid gentrification of our cities.

details

  • Runtime

    81 min
  • Country

    United States
  • Year of Presentation

    2013
  • Year of Production

    2012
  • Director

    Su Friedrich
  • Cast

  • Production Company

    Outcast Films
  • Berlinale Section

    Panorama
  • Berlinale Category

    Documentary Film

Biography Su Friedrich

Born in New Haven, Connecticut to a German mother, she studied art and art history in Chicago and at the Oberlin College in Ohio. In 1996 she was a guest of the Berlinale Panorama section with HIDE AND SEEK. Her documentaries have won several awards at international film festivals. Her films are in collectinos at the MoMA, New York and Centre Pompidou in Paris. She lives in New York and teaches at Princeton University.

Filmography Su Friedrich

1978 Hot Water | 1979 Cool Hands, Warm Heart | 1979 Scar Tissue | 1980 I Suggest Mine | 1981 Gently Down The Stream | 1982 But No One | 1984 The Ties That Bind | 1987 Damned If You Don‘t | 1990 Sink Or Swim | 1991 First Comes Love | 1993 Rules Of The Road | 1993 The Lesbian Avengers Eat Fire Too | 1996 Hide And Seek | 2002 The Odds Of Recovery | 2004 The Head Of A Pin | 2005 Seeing Red | 2008 From The Ground Up | 2011 Conservation 101 | 2012 Practice Makes Perfect | 2012 Gut Renovation