From: Andy Ditzler (email suppressed)
Date: Fri Apr 25 2008 - 15:55:56 PDT
Dear Zac,
Gerald Barrett and Wendy Brabner's book "Stan Brakhage: A guide to
references and resources" (G. K. Hall & Co., 1983) makes reference to a
letter from Brakhage published in Filmmakers Newsletter 1 (no. 2),
December 1967. Description: "A letter written to Jonas Mekas (late
September 1967) in which Brakhage delineates his reasons for withdrawing
from the Film-Makers' Cooperative and Cinematheque. As much a diatribe
against the hippie movement as it is against the Co-op, he cites the
corruption of the Co-op by the hippies as his primary motivation for
withdrawing his films."
Certainly sounds close to what you're describing! However, this date
would make it about three years after Warhol won the Independent Film
Award.
Alas, the collection in our library here begins with April 1968.
However, research libraries in your area should be able to help, perhaps
via Interlibrary Loan. I would also try Anthology's library. Even if
they don't have the original letter, they may very well have the
newsletter in which it was published.
Andy Ditzler
Atlanta, GA
www.frequentsmallmeals.com
----- Original Message -----
From: "Z O" <email suppressed>
To: <email suppressed>
Sent: Friday, April 25, 2008 10:20 AM
Subject: Brakhage leaves the shade
Hello,
I am new to the list. I have a question that could maybe turn into a
topic. It involves a letter Brakhage wrote to Mekas in 64. It seems
that it is a fairly famous letter, but I haven't been able to track it
down. It is about his withdrawing his films from the Film Maker's
Co-Op. It says, I have been able to find fragments of the letter, this
"I cannot in good conscience continue to accept the help of institutions
which have come to propagate advertisements for forces which I recognize
as among the most destructive in the world today: "dope", self-centred
Love, unqualified Hatred, Nihilism, violence to self and society."
I guess it was in regard to Andy Warhol having won the independent film
maker's award. Can any one tell me where I can find this letter? I
found a letter to Mekas in the 'Brakhage Scrapbook' from 82, but it was
only referencing his actions of removing his films from Anthology and
Film Maker's Co-Op... Does any one know where I can find the original,
ground shaking, as it were, letter?
-Zac
---- Apomorphine is no word and no image — […] It is simply a question of putting through an inoculation program in the very limited time that remains — Word begets image and image IS virus — At what moment does one start making indifferent art? From the moment that one is less of an artist, when the necessity of making puts down its roots in memory alone. I believe my exhibitions depend and still depend on memories of a period when I assumed the creative situation in a heroic and solitary manner. In other words, it used to be: read this, look at this. Today it is: allow me to present... I didn't want to be obsessed with how to use the world, and that's part of my ambivalence towards my art work. I finally managed to shut the voices up, mostly by ignoring them. I basically stopped doing art work, and when I felt the urge to make a piece I just waited until the feeling went away. __________________________________________________________________ For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.