OPM + Home Movies: The Legacy of Uncle Nick

MEMBERSHIP SCREENING

16mm home movies accompanied by live vinyl musical set by Les The DJ

After arriving to the US from the Philippines in 1926, Nicholas G. Viernes started off in the Pacific Northwest, became a migrant farmer, and ended up in Chicago where for decades he was the “unofficial community historian” for the Filipino American community. “Uncle Nick,” as he was known, took his 16mm camera with him around town, capturing in black and white and color the everyday life of middle-class Filipino Americans. They’re dressed in their Sunday best, they relax by the beach, they play baseball in the park, and they wave to the camera. They are ordinary Americans, but they’re also impossibly extraordinary. These are mixed-race families, posing outside of tragedy, strife, or the anthropological logic of immigration narratives. Like Dave Tasuno’s incarceration camp footage, these defiant reels have the gaze of a hobbyist, the neighborly love of a community member, and the impulse of a critic, producing counter-images for a population invisible in society.

For decades, Uncle Nick’s home movies sat with photographs, tapes, and other community materials at the Filipino American Historical Society of Chicago, from where they were recently brought back to life thanks to the Chicago Film Society and the University of Chicago’s South Side Home Movie Project. Leading the cause was archivist Ashley Dequilla, who spearheaded the restoration and this traveling exhibition project, “The Legacy of Uncle Nick.” Bringing together newly-struck 16mm prints of Viernes’ films from the 1930s with an all-OPM (Original Pilipino Music) set by Les The DJ, Dequilla bridges past and present, the plastic image and the live audience, through glorious analog. Join us for this unforgettable evening of movies and music, from Uncle Nick’s home to our own.

– Brian Hu

FREE pre- and post-screening receptions for Pac Arts members, All-Fest Pass, and OPM + Home Movies: The Legacy of Uncle Nick ticketholders.

Pre-Screening Reception: 5:00 – 7:00 PM
Post-Screening After Party: TIME TBA

Co-presented by Folk Art Rare Records.