Ghost in the Shell

1995, Mamoru Oshii, Japan, 83 min., Japanese with English subtitles

Introduced by artist Sahana Ramakrishnan

In the not-too-distant future, humans are connected to each other and the world by a vast electronic network, with “shells” containing their consciousness. Cyborg agent Major Motoko Kusangi works in federal intelligence, and he’s on a mission to track the Puppet Master, who ghost-hacks into the bodies of fellow cyborgs, altering their minds and memories.

Cabaret Cinema is showing the original animated movie from 1995, which is considered a groundbreaking work of Japanese anime, as part of Chitra Ganesh’s fellowship, Face of the Future.

“Ghost in the Shell stands as one of the pioneering films of anime history, one that captures the imagination with its intricate story and dazzles the eyes with its gorgeous animation.”

—Jeff Beck

About Cabaret Cinema: Face of the Future

Curated by Rubin Museum fellow and artist Chitra Ganesh, Cabaret Cinema takes its cue from the exhibition Face of the Future, in which emerging artists reimagine how the visual languages of science fiction and fantasy take shape and proliferate around the world through cinema. Each film will be introduced by an artist whose work expands and redefines the aesthetics of science fiction, explored in posters that can be viewed in the Art Lounge gallery just outside the theater.

Chitra Ganesh: Face of the Future is made possible by Rasika and Girish Reddy, Manoj and Rita Singh, Akhoury Foundation, and contributors to the 2018 Exhibitions Fund.

About the Introducer

Sahana Ramakrishnan was born in Mumbai, India, and raised in Singapore. She travelled to the United States to complete her BFA in painting at RISD and has since been living and working in Brooklyn. Her multimedia drawings are webs of cultural interface. Mixtures of Hindu, Buddhist, and Greek visual mythologies weave together into tapestries of pop cultural references that are upended by the artist’s exploration of identity, sexuality, and gender perspectives.

Sahana’s work has been exhibited in the Rubin Museum, the NARS Foundation, Field Projects, Gateway Project Spaces, Elizabeth Foundation of the Arts, A.I.R. Gallery, Front Art Space, and more. She was recently an artist in residence at Yaddo, Saratoga Springs, New York. Sahana was previously a recipient of the SIP fellowship at the Robert Blackburn Printmaking workshop, the Feminist-in-Residence program at Gateway Project Spaces, the Yale/Norfolk Summer program, and the Florence Lief grant from RISD.