Catalogue > At random

American Water is a short documentary which focuses on two characters, Glenda and ?Redbeard?, who live and work alongside the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, in southern Illinois. Glenda runs her father?s business, ?Fred?s Fish Market?, from a small wooden shack next to the levees protecting the town of Cairo. ?Redbeard? ekes out a living in the backwoods of Thebes, on the banks of the Mississippi. Both Glenda and Redbeard talk with disarming candour and shrewd folk-wisdom about the traditional culture, declining economy and fragile ecology of this ?heartland? region bordering the American South. Demonstrating how to gut a catfish and spit-train a dog, American Water is a portrait of two spirited individuals existing on the margins of society, where two mighty rivers meet, in a forgotten corner of the United States.

Jacob Cartwright & Nick Jordan are artists and film-makers based in Manchester, UK. Their collaborative work explores the relationship between the natural world and our multifaceted cultural histories. They recently completed a trilogy of films centred on the writings of the 19th century artist-naturalist John James Audubon (DVD published & distributed by Cornerhouse). Their documentary The Reapers was awarded best experimental film at the 2009 London Short Film Festival, and in 2010 the festival held a retrospective screening of their work. Cartwright & Jordan?s recent film festivals and group exhibitions include Documenta, Madrid; Practical Truths, Castlefield Gallery, Manchester; Darwin`s Eye, Institut National d`Histoire de l`Art (INHA), Paris; Lines of Desire, Oriel Davies Gallery, Newtown; Art, Science & the Origin of Species, Ohio State University, Columbus, USA; The New York Film Festival; 3rd Beijing Independent Film Festival, Songzhuang, China; Voices From The Water, Bangalore, India. They are currently making their debut feature-length film, Between Two Rivers, a documentary portrait on the troubled town of Cairo, Illinois. www.betweentworivers.net.