Jim Jarmusch and Carter Logan

Acclaimed filmmaker Jim Jarmusch (Stranger Than Paradise, Down by Law, and Mystery Train) and multi-instrumentalist Carter Logan perform together as SQÜRL, a self-described “enthusiastically marginal rock band from New York City who like big drums and distorted guitars, cassette recorders, loops, feedback, sad country songs, molten stoner core, chopped and screwed hip-hop." Logan works with Jarmusch as a producer and composer with credits including The Dead Don’t Die, Only Lovers Left Alive, Paterson, and Broken Flowers.

For this Speaker Series event, they will perform a live score to silent films by Dadaist and Surrealist artist Man Ray in addition to new sonic projects. Using loops, analogue synthesizers, and effected guitars, the duo create a semi-improvised ambient score for four of Man Ray's dreamlike films. Of the project, Jarmusch says: “Man Ray's films are very kinetic in the way they move. It's like a kind of dream logic. Man Ray loves little details of daily life as the Surrealists did. He likes these strange things. A starfish in a jar. Or a scattering of a tailor's pins” (Metro Times).

Supported by the University of Michigan Library, the Department of Film, Television, and Media, and the Ann Arbor Film Festival.