Image: Mike Henderson, The Shape of Things, 1981

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Screening 2 p.m., Floor 1, Phyllis Wattis Theater

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Music 3:45 p.m., Floor 2, Koret Education Center

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This program is presented by SFMOMA in collaboration with Canyon Cinema and co-presented by MoAD.

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“Henderson’s movies are the first movies in the world to bring the authentic ‘talkin’ blues’ tradition into film. The Last Supper and Dufus are illustrated funky blues. His films are the best I’ve seen anywhere in a long time.”
— Robert Nelson

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Mike Henderson: Trouble in Mind celebrates the irreverent, boundary-defying work of a Bay Area icon. The 16mm films assembled here, recently preserved by the Academy Film Archive, evidence a journey of personal and aesthetic exploration across the 1970s and 1980s, mapping Henderson’s expansion from expressionist painting and blues music into experimental filmmaking. Together, these films represent a vital contribution to West Coast avant-garde cinema and counterculture. At turns comical, incisive, freewheeling, and confounding, Henderson’s films disrupt categorization and trouble interpretation. “I think we try to make too much sense out of every goddamn thing,” Henderson says. But even at their obfuscating best, his films are often punctuated with amusing reveals and sharpened insights. The program concludes with Robert Nelson’s Deep Westurn, a “film wake” and whimsical elegy for a departed friend, featuring Henderson, Nelson, and fellow artists William Geis and William T. Wiley.

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Curated by Brett Kashmere (Executive Director, Canyon Cinema) with assistance from Ashley Tacheira and Autumn Armstrong.

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A Q + A with Mike Henderson will follow the screening. Afterwards, the Mike Henderson Band will perform in SFMOMA’s Koret Education Center.

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Screening Lineup

The Last Supper (Mike Henderson, 1970/73, 8 min., color, 16mm)
Ducksarenodinner (Mike Henderson, 1983, 4 min., black and white, 16mm)
The Shape of Things (Mike Henderson, 1981, 8 min., black and white and color, 16mm)
Dufus (aka Art) (Mike Henderson, 1970/73, 6 min., black and white, 16mm)
Pitchfork and the Devil (Mike Henderson, 1979, 15 min., black and white and color, 16mm)
When & Where (Mike Henderson, 1984, 4 min., black and white, 16mm)
Just Another Notion (Mike Henderson, 1983, 3 min., color, 16mm)
Down Hear (Mike Henderson, 1972, 12 min., black and white, 16mm)
Deep Westurn (Robert Nelson, 1974, 5 min., color, 16mm)

Approximate total running time: 64 min.

About the Artist

Mike Henderson is a pioneering African American artist, filmmaker, and musician whose dynamic practice has spanned more than 50 years. Born and raised in Marshall, Missouri, he moved to the Bay Area to attend the San Francisco Art Institute in 1965. His early breakthrough figurative paintings from this period reveal the spirit of protest and social justice in 1960s San Francisco, as well as the vibrant community of artists and friends that would nourish his creativity for decades to come. Today, he is known for abstract, highly gestural paintings that demonstrate a palpable connection to postwar abstraction and a defining instinct for improvisation. In addition to painting, Henderson is an accomplished blues guitarist and filmmaker.

Accessibility Information

Accessibility accommodations such as American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation and assisted listening devices are available upon request 10 business days in advance.

Please email publicengagement@sfmoma.org, and we will do our best to fulfill your request.

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This program is presented in conjunction with the exhibition, People Make This Place: SFAI Stories

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