Films by Hiroshi Sunairi: Making Mistakes and Tree Project Film

In the summer of 2010, artist and filmmaker Hiroshi Sunairi traveled to Xining, a city at the edge of the old Tibetan region in Amdo Province, China. He set out to create a documentary on the Yushu earthquake, which caused a massive disaster earlier that year in the town of Gyegu, but decided to travel elsewhere because of severe altitude sickness. The product of this decision is a beautifully filmed account of his attempt to make a documentary, as well as his unintended journey through the Tibetan Plateau. Making Mistakes (62 min.) is a soul-searching Buddhist tale of letting go and losing oneself among the spectacular landscapes of the “rooftop of the world.” Tree Project Film (11 min.) is a portrait of Chikara Horiguchi, a tree doctor in Hiroshima who specializes in caring for hibaku trees, those that survived the atomic bombings. Horiguchi’s story is augmented by current footage of some of the iconic hibaku trees, including Camphor, Plantae, Ginkgo, and Camilia. Since 2005, Sunairi has distributed seeds from hibaku trees to people around the world, which was documented in Leur Existence – Tree Project, an exhibition held at The Hort in Winter 2009-10.

Admission is free for students and Horticultural Society of New York members, and $5 for non-members. Please register online or email programs@thehort.org.