Winning awards at Sundance and the Berlinale, this vibrant, vital portrait of lesbian experimental filmmaker Barbara Hammer explores her radical life, work and legacy.
An avant-garde film in the manner of Hammer’s work, educating people about the iconic artist while also making them experience the sort of film Hammer was known for.
Barbara Forever 2026
Barbara Hammer was inspired to make experimental films about her personal life after seeing Maya Deren’s Meshes of the Afternoon at film school in the early 1970s. Once she came out as a lesbian, aged 30, she “took off on a motorcycle with a super-8 camera” and in 1974 filmed Dyketactics, widely considered to be one of the first lesbian films. Going on to make over 90 films across her fifty-year career, she became a guiding star for feminists, lesbians and experimental filmmakers the world over.
She proudly documented her lesbian life, body and lovers, often navigating the interpersonal impacts of such intimate artmaking on her romantic relationships, always remaining courageously committed to her own creative freedom.
This archive-driven documentary by filmmaker Brydie O’Connor won the Jonathan Oppenheim Editing Award at Sundance and the Teddy Award for Best Documentary at Berlinale. Produced by Christine Vachon (Zola NZIFF 2020, Past Lives NZIFF 2023) Barbara Forever collages together thirty years of Barbara’s own footage, forming not just an electric portrait of this queer cinema icon but a tribute to the value of making art of one’s own life.
– Amanda Jane Robinson