From: esperanza collado (email suppressed)
Date: Mon May 21 2007 - 03:16:37 PDT
DARKLIGHT SYMPOSIUM
DUBLIN, IRELAND
21st-24th of June 2007
See entire programme:
http://www.darklight-filmfestival.com/
FORUM. ARTISTS & FILMMAKERS:
NEW PRACTICES IN PRODUCTION, EXHIBITION & EDUCATION
Saturday 23rd of June
Filmbase 11:00-12:30pm
www.darklight.ie
In recent years, the familiar boundaries between art and film have
been called into question by practicioners, critics and educators.
While artists seems increasingly drawn to the modes of exhibition and
production that were traditionally associated with cinema, the film
and television industries are currently undergoing a period of
significant change, in which multiple and diverse structures of
production and exhibition are emerging. Is it possible for artists and
filmmakers to learn from each other, particularly in relation to
low-badget projects? For example, do those coming from a visual art
discipline have access to different resources, enabling them to
produce work on much smaller budgets than is usual in the industry?
Discussion led by:
Maeve Connolly (Department of Film & Media at IADT)
With:
PAUL ROWLEY (Visual Artist and Filmmaker)
CHRISTINE MOLLOY AND JOE LAWLOR (Desperate Optimists Filmmakers)
ESPERANZA COLLADO (Ph.D. on Experimental Film)
PIP CHODOROV (Director of Re:Voir Films, Filmmaker)
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Irish Film Institute/Film Base
Sunday 24th of June
SCREENING PROGRAMME: STRUCTURAL/MATERIALIST FILM
Curated by Esperanza Collado
The term Structural/Materialist in relation to avant-garde cinema was
first coined in the mid 1960's/early 80s by Adams Sitney and Peter
Gidal respectively. It defines a specific movement within film
production that emphasized the physical properties of the medium.
Structural/Materialist films attempted to demonstrate that "films are
made out of printed celluloid and not out of this world at large"
(Frampton). In addition, these films often induce the spectator to
analyze internal articulations to facilitate attention toward the
procedures in which the films were actually constructed. In this
sense, the filmstrip –a ribbon of physical material- becomes a
significant constituent in its own and pure presence. Even though this
statement turns out to be obsolete in contemporary computer film and
video production, the artists Michael Snow and Hollis Frampton (whose
films we present in this programme), not only led the way for
Structural/Materialist filmmaking; they also represent an important
reference to digital art practices.
Zorn's Lemma (1970) by Hollis Frampton, a digital pioneer who worked
with computers in the premature pre-PC days, is a metaphor of the
principles of mathematics and physics, executed through algorithmic
codes. Wavelength (1966), by Canadian multidisciplinary artist Michael
Snow, presents a creative invitation to consider the various
intersections between film and new technological developments.
Wavelength is a monument to the construction of time and space in
relation to the perception of a film, and includes a narrative
dimension; a very unusual aspect in the structural film practice. As
Michael Snow, Anthony McCall is an artist currently working within
digital platforms. His film installation Line Describing a Cone
(1973), described by the artist as a 'solid light film', questions the
traditional film limitations by drawing attention to the projector's
cone of light and its interaction with the physical presence of the
audience. These films, that very much announced the imminent passing
of the film era, emphasize the structural and material properties of
the medium. In addition, the films included in this programme invite
the spectator to analyze the geometry evident within their structure:
Zorn's Lemma acquires the shape of the alphabet while Wavelength, as
Line Describing a Cone, highlight a quasi-sculptural, conical form.
Michael Snow 'WAVELENGTH'
Canada, 1966-67, sound, colour, 45 mins, 16mm
Winner of the Grand Prix 4th International Experimental Film Festival. Knokke.
'One of the few truly original works of the current avant-garde, a
perfect example of the cinema of stillness and poetic contemplation
weaving its hypnotic charms so deviously that many who come to scoff
remain transfixed. Wavelength is one of those few films that compel
the viewer regardless of his personal reactions to speculate on the
very essence of the medium and inevitably of reality.' - Amos Vogel.
'Wavelength was not only by far the best film at the Brussels Festival
but opened a whole new area and dimension for the avant-garde cinema.'
- Shirley Clarke.
'Described by its creator as a 'continuous zoom which takes 45 minutes
to go from its widest field to its smallest and final field'
Wavelength is at once one of the simplest and most complex films ever
conceived. Literally oscillating between the conceptual and the
immediately real, its four human occurrences interrupt yet remain in
to the flow of continually metamorphosing variations on the
unrelenting crescendo of its 'one shot' toward and into the four
windows of a Canal Street Loft.' - Film Quarterly.
Hollis Frampton 'ZORNS LEMMA'
United States, 1970, sound, colour, 60s mins, 16mm
"Frampton developed some of his earliest films around systems, not
narratives. His most visible, and widely seen early work, was the
feature length Zorns Lemma (1970). The 60 minutes film was organized
around the form of the alphabet, with images replacing letters, until
24 letters had become photographic ideograms, and the letters replaced
the pictures. The central part of the film is prefaced by the 1800
edition of "The Bay State Primer" and is followed by an 11th century
text by Robert Grosseteste. Watching the film first tries one's
patience and then becomes a delight –it is a unique experience".
Robert Haller.
"In his most important work to date, and the most original new work of
cinema I have seen since Brakhage's Scenes From Under Childhood: Part
IV. Frampton's film is an exercise in mathematical logic in cinema. Or
is it a mechanical logic?... It's about alphabet. It's about the
unities of similarities. It's about sameness in confusion. It's about
logic in chance. It's about structure and logic. It's about rhythm.
Ah, what a difference between Zorns Lemma and all the 'serious'
commercial movies that I occasionally praise!" -- Jonas Mekas, Village
Voice.
"... the ultimate Frampton film, so far... he looks back on several of
the dialogues his earlier films rehearsed: the tension between words
on the screen and concrete images arose in SURFACE TENSION, it
explodes here; the cyclic repetitive variations of ARTIFICIAL LIGHT,
are less repetitive, less varied, than the alphabetic cycles here;
ZORNS LEMMA exaggerates the fixed rhythms of PALINDROME and insists
upon the pulse of one second with incredible obdurance... ... At a
time when radical uniqueness seems progressively less probable, Hollis
Frampton has made a film that is absolutely one of its kind." -- P.
Adams Sitney, 1970s.
Anthony McCall 'LINE DESCRIBING A CONE'
UK, 1973, silent, B&W, 30 mins, 16mm?
"In Line Describing a Cone, the conventional primacy of the screen is
completely abandoned in favour of the primacy of the projection event.
According to McCall, a screen is not even mandatory. He succinctly
describes the film: 'The viewer watches the film, by standing with
his, or her, back towards what would normally be the screen, and
looking along the beam towards the projector itself. The film begins
as a coherent line of light, like a laser beam, and develops through
the 30 minute duration into a complete, hollow cone of light.?The
audience is expected to move up and down, in and out of the beam -
this cannot be fully experienced by a stationary spectator. The shift
of image as a function of shift of perspective is the operative
principle of the film. External content is eliminated, and the entire
film consists of the controlled line of light emanating from the
projector; the act of appreciating the film-i.e., 'the process of its
realisation'-is the content." - Deke Dusinberre, Studio International,
Nov/Dec 1975..
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Saturday 23rd of June
Filmbase
PARACINEMA: FILM BEYOND ITS LIMITS
Master Class: Esperanza Collado
Paracinema, a term coined in the early 1970's by the artist Hollis
Frampton, defines 'phenomena that share at least one element with
cinema; e.g. modularity with respect to space or time'. The term
acquires important signification when applied to contemporary art
practices, especially to those cinematic works that challenge the
material limitations of the medium.
What are the historical precedents of paracinema and how do we address
this term in contemporary digital practice? Is film the only medium
that expresses the idea of cinema? How is film exhibited within an art
space? How has the role of the spectator changed towards the
presentation of these new forms of paracinema?
This talk will focus on the renewed interest in this kind of ephemeral
work, by analyzing historical cinematic art-works that often call
themselves films, despite the fact that they are embodied in other
materials. This new approach –the collapse of art and moving-image-
affects the visual arts in all their many facets. In order to examine
the transformations within film materiality, this talk will provide
the opportunity to discover key works that have rarely been shown
within this field, including Bill Brand's installation pieces
Masstransiscope and Pong Ping Pong.
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-- Esperanza Collado Sánchez http://www.myspace.com/spectrumcinema http://www.youtube.com/esperanzacollado http://www.flickr.com/photos/esperanzacollado/ __________________________________________________________________ For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.