The Museum of Modern Art will present three restored films highlighting the LGBTQ+ experience as part of its annual To Save and Project, The 19th MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation, in a program titled Reclaiming the LGBTQ Past, at The Museum of Modern Art screening January 24th at 7:00 p.m. Upon completion of the screenings, a conversation will be held between Karen Bellone (director, Death by Unnatural Causes), Lisa Rinzler (director, Death by Unnatural Causes), Greta Schiller (producer, Greetings from Washington, D.C.) and Lucy Winer (director and producer, Greetings from Washington, D.C.).

The program will include the following three films:

• Death by Unnatural Causes (1990). USA. Directed by Karen Bellone, Lisa Rinzler. World premiere. 18 min.
* Followed by a conversation with directors Karen Bellone and Lisa Rinzler

• Greetings from Washington, D.C. (1981). USA. Directed by Lucy Winer. New York premiere. 28 min.
* Followed by a conversation with director/producer Lucy Winer and producer Greta Schiller

• Tricia’s Wedding (1971). USA. Directed by Milton Miron (credited as “Sebastian”). New York premiere. 33 min.

From the AIDS crisis to the turbulent years following the Stonewall uprising, this program covers two decades of protest, expression, and loss. In the elegiac Death by Unnatural Causes (1990), Karen Bellone and Lisa Rinzler capture the rage and bewilderment over the untimely passing of so many friends. Featuring Kid Congo Powers and music by downtown New York exemplars such as Arto Lindsay, Marc Ribot, and John Lurie, the film’s avant-garde aural energy is matched by cinematographer Rinzler’s striking visuals, which are all the more distinctive in IndieCollect’s vibrant restoration.

The Outfest UCLA Legacy Project continues to expand LGBTQ+ history through their restoration efforts, including this important work by trailblazing queer filmmakers Rob Epstein, Frances Reid, Greta Schiller, and Lucy Winer. The group chronicled the first National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights, held on October 14, 1979, in Greetings from Washington, D.C. (1981).

In Tricia’s Wedding (1971), another restoration from the UCLA Film & Television Archive, San Francisco’s famed hippie troupe the Cockettes put on a drag parody of First Daughter Patricia Nixon’s wedding in an anarchic and fun piece of political theater. It was so incendiary that alarmed Nixon staffers screened it in the White House bomb shelter!

Tickets will be available for purchase beginning on January 17th.