D’Est (From the East) by Chantal Akerman

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Celebrated film editor Claire Atherton began to work as a video technician with the Centre audiovisuel Simone de Beauvoir in 1981. While she was interested in sound and worked as a cinematographer, Atherton often credits her interest in Chinese language and Taoist philosophy with leading her to become an editor.

Atherton began her 30-year-long collaboration with Chantal Akerman in 1984, when she worked with the Belgian filmmaker and visual artist on a video recording of the theater play Letters Home. Atherton edited many of Akerman’s documentary and fiction projects, including her last film No Home Movie (2015). The two also co-conceived all of Akerman’s installations, from the 25-channel video work Bordering on Fiction: Chantal Akerman’s “D’Est” (1995), part of the Walker’s collection, to Now (2015). Atherton is currently responsible for the conception and layout of the artist’s installations globally. Recently, she curated Facing the Image, an exhibition dedicated to Akerman’s work, at La Virreina Centre de la Imatge in Barcelona and Artium Museoa in Vitoria-Gasteiz. 

Today, Atherton continues to work as an editor with many other filmmakers and artists, including Éric Baudelaire, Andreas Bolm, Emmanuelle Demoris, Luc Decaster, André Gil Mata, Bani Khoshnoudi, Maria Kourkouta, Noëlle Pujol, and Wang Bing.