Words of Mercury (2011) by Jerome Hiler

Friday, August 21, 2026, 7:00 pm

Nathaniel Dorsky & Jerome Hiler: Film Offerings Program 3

Four Films by Jerome Hiler

BERKELEY ART MUSEUM AND PACIFIC FILM ARCHIVE

2155 Center Street

Berkeley, CA 94720

Jerome Hiler In Person
Presented in association with Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive
Admission: $18 General / $12 Cinematheque Members
Event tickets here

Nathaniel Dorsky & Jerome Hiler: Film Offerings
August 14–29, 2026

Nathaniel Dorsky and Jerome Hiler have lived in the Bay Area since 1971, relocating here from New York City and its environs. Their lives are intertwined as filmmakers, life partners and lovers of art, poetry and the natural world. One of their favorite haunts is BAMPFA, where they have attended countless programs as devoted members of our audience.

Both Dorsky and Hiler are articulate about their approach to filmmaking, sharing what motivates each project and, in turn, how their view of life and the world have grown. Dorsky’s Hours for Jerome, Parts 1 & 2, filmed between 1966 and 1970, is a beautiful portrait of their lives together on the East Coast. The second program, a selection of five lyrical films by Dorsky, includes Alaya, a meditation on landscape with an uncanny sense of scale, from the particulate to infinite space. Hiler will share four works distinguished by his interest in color and philosophical musings, including his pivotal Words of Mercury and his most recent film, Careless Passage. The series concludes with Dorsky’s monumental Arboretum Cycle, seven exquisite works filmed in Golden Gate Park and edited within the course of one year.

BAMPFA is proud to represent both Dorsky and Hiler as their archive of record; each filmmaker has entrusted our institution with the long-term care and preservation of their films. This series offers a wonderful occasion to share some of the gems from the BAMPFA collection.

—Susan Oxtoby, Director of Film and Senior Film Curator

Nathaniel Dorsky & Jerome Hiler: Film Offerings
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Nathaniel Dorsky & Jerome Hiler: Film Offerings — Program 3
Four Films by Jerome Hiler
Friday, August 21, 7 PM
Jerome Hiler In Person

Jerome Hiler presents four films, including an early work, Gladly Given (1997); Words of Mercury (2011); Marginalia (2016) and his most recent film, Careless Passage (2024).

SCREENING:
Words of Mercury (2011) by Jerome Hiler (US); 16mm, color, silent, 22 minutes.
Gladly Given (1997) by Jerome Hiler (US); 16mm, color, silent, 13 minutes.
Marginalia (2016) by Jerome Hiler (US); 16mm, color, silent, 17 minutes.
Careless Passage (2024) by Jerome Hiler (US); 16mm, color, silent, 20 minutes.
TRT: 72 minutes

Words of Mercury (2011) by Jerome Hiler

The film takes a journey from darkness and a bare world through the seasonal spreading of seeds to a place almost choked and repugnant with color—a place that invites death. (Jerome Hiler)

Gladly Given (1997) by Jerome Hiler

Fragile and challenging in its seeming simplicity, Gladly Given unfolds and bristles with the delicacy of a Japanese Floating World painting while being gravitationally drawn into the containments and accidents of the everyday. (Mark McElhatten)

Marginalia (2016) by Jerome Hiler

Marginalia is a contemplation in shades of grey and periodic color on the state and place of society in a quickly changing environment. (Jerome Hiler)

Careless Passage (2024) by Jerome Hiler

Wandering through the ordinary sights of day and night. How, in this vast cosmos, did all this happen?…[The film’s] purpose is to muse and swim among migrant sights seen by the transforming eye of a camera. (Jerome Hiler)