Filmmaker. Larry Kent was born in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1939. He came to Vancouver from South Africa at nineteen. He would direct and produce his first four feature films between the age of twenty-four and twenty-eight and, in the process, make the first independent Canadian feature length film and (infamously) show the first naked breast in the history of Canadian cinema. He made his first film, Hastings Street (1963), while a student at University of British Columbia. His second film, The Bitter Ash (1963), along with Sweet Substitute (1964), explore post-adolescent sexual angst in an emotionally raw and stylistically daring manner. Kent moved to Montreal shortly thereafter, where he continued to make challenging narrative films, often foregrounding feminist themes while problematizing “hippie†ideals. Despite international critical acclaim, Kent fell into obscurity in Canada, until a professor at the University of Concordia took up Kent’s work, resuscitating Kent’s career. He made headlines again in 2003 for his film The Hamster Cage, a biting look at one family’s emotional and sexual dysfunction. Kent lives and works in Montreal.
Discrete project sites documenting the work of specific artists and collectives in detail.
Essays and conversation providing a context for exploring the Project Sites and Archives.
Video interviews conducted between December 2008 and May 2009 reflecting on Vancouver’s art scene in the sixties.