Independent filmmaker Alan Berliner, who is not afraid to point the camera at himself for his experimental documentaries, will spend a week on campus teaching, showing his films, and discussing an exhibition of two of his installations.

The film screenings, lecture, and exhibition are all free and open to the general public during Berliner's visit, which runs from March 30 to April 3.

Berliner garnered widespread attention for his personal documentaries The Sweetest Sound and Nobody's Business, which he followed with Wide Awake, a uniquely personal tour through his lifelong obsession with insomnia.

An interdisciplinary symposium -- Nature/Place/Cinema -- will be spread out over two weekends and two campuses (Colgate University and Hamilton College) providing students with behind-the-scenes access to filmmakers and film scholars.

The series of screenings and lectures will draw attention to the depiction of place and the environment, as well as the history of the nature film. It will also examine cinematic manifestations of place, as it relates to contemporary culture, history, and habitat.

Nature/Place/Cinema begins this Friday at 4:15 p.m. at Hamilton College with a screening of John Gianvito's Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind.