From: Jeremy Rossen (email suppressed)
Date: Tue Mar 24 2009 - 23:13:09 PDT
Hello Frameworkers,
Sorry for the late notice, hope all of you in the Pacific Northwest can make
it out for these shows. [Cinema Project loves Ben Rivers!]
Also we now [mostly] have our Spring 2009 calendar online, please take a look,
we are very excited about it: www.cinemaproject.org
Love,
Cinema Project
AH, LIBERTY! THE FILMS OF BEN RIVERS
March 25 + 26 2009
7:30pm (doors open at 7pm)
11 NW 13th ave. 4th floor
Portland Oregon
We welcome British filmmaker and programmer Ben Rivers for two nights of screenings
of his much-acclaimed 16mm films. In 1996, Ben co-founded and since
co-managed/programmed Brighton Cinematheque-renowned for screening a unique program
of film from its earliest days through to the latest artist's film and video.
A young and highly prolific filmmaker, Rivers films are beautifully shot and
hand-processed documents showing old, crumbling houses and folks living out of the
way in shacks and tall grass. In Rivers films there is an intimacy and appreciation
for his subjects, which is protected by limited revelations and sparse soundtracks.
The films are landscapes, but not old-fashioned, or tending towards the ideal; there
is a reality and brutality in the imagery. In Astika, a Danish recluse says "they're
only here because I let it go wild, but no one sees that," meaning first the birds
and frogs, and then the people forcing him off his overgrown land. These are scenes
from a child's paradise, complete with piles of spare tires and spinning cookies in
broken-down cars in an empty field. They are current, common histories, odes to the
freedom fighters that would have, in the past, come in ballad form. A sense of
freedom runs throughout the films, suggesting any rural setting where safety does
not trump the joy of smashing around.
MARCH 25 + 26
We The People [2004, 16mm, b&w, sound, 1 min.]
Old Dark House [2003, 16mm, b&w, sound, 4 min.]
HOUSE [2005/7, 16mm, b&w, silent, 5 min.]
The Coming Race [2006, 16mm, b&w, sound, 5 min.]
Astika [2006, 16mm, color, sound, 8min.]
Dove Coup [2006, 16mm, b&w, sound, 2 min.]
Origin of the Species [2008, 16mm, color, sound, 16 min.]
This Is My Land [2006, 16mm, b&w, sound, 14 min.]
Ah, Liberty! [2008, anamorphic 16mm, b&w, sound, 19 min.]
A World Rattled Of Habit [2008, 16mm on video, color/b&w, sound, 10min.]
I Know Where I'm Going in-progress [2009, 16mm on video, color, sound, 10 min.]
Date: Wed, 25 Mar 2009 00:52:44 -0400
From: email suppressed
Subject: Re: Gabriel by Agnes Martin
To: email suppressed
cari machet
nyc 347-298-9818
AIM carismachet
Skype carimachet - 646-652-6434
Syria +963-099 277 3243
Amman +962 077 636 9407
On Tue, Mar 24, 2009 at 5:12 PM, malgosia askanas <email suppressed> wrote:
Cari wrote:
black and white thinking
i avoid that like i avoid putting my film of my friend brodie the cat
into circulation
Actually, what you posted seemed all-grey, so I greyed it up a bit more, to see what happens. There was no black and no white involved.
hahahaa
text black background white
if you want specificity
as far as my analysis of the film i see no large difference between it and a brakhage film when he films a cat - that was my exact reference point in the post - the only difference to me is in my mind because i know that brakhage filmed his wife having a baby, an autopsy... other more 'amazing' things than the cat
Cari, but if this is the case, why go see an experimental film at all? Seeing a cat surely beats seeing any images of a cat,
no because the thing about art is that it is co-creative
it is a relationship between the artist and the subject
yes the optics can often be the art - the highest form of art
- the optical experience one has in the viewing of a cat -
however not all humans experience this height
therefore there is a need to share
OK, so then what did you mean when you said " i see no large difference between it [Martin's film] and a brakhage film when he films a cat"? Did you mean the heights of all "cat viewings" (irrespective of the kind of cat, its mood, the situation, etc.) are interchangeable, and also interchangeable with the heights of all "kid viewings", and all creative relationships of film-makers with their (animal) subjects are interchangeable, and therefore there is no real difference between a Martin film showing a kid, and any Brakhage film showing a cat? Or did you mean something very particular to Martin's film and (a particular) Brakhage film?
yes the specific film i was referencing was his last cat film
i am sorry it is sloppy but i do not know it's name
but i am also aware that he made more of them
know as well that i made a cat film which i refuse to put out there
so i am biased of my own work
i am biased of 'cute' at times
i will not change that and kind of hate the word and feel bad about hating it all at the same time
and
i was also referencing my viewing of a super 8 film made by brakhages' son
which made my head sort go to the side like a dog does (cute - haha)
Also, what you said sounded as if the only real difference between experiences was how "spectacular" they were - you appreciated Brakhage's cat more than Martin's kid not because Brakhage better succeeded in capturing the height of a "cat viewing", but because you knew he also made movies of more spectacular events. Would Martin be more of a "filmmaker" if "Gabriel" included, say, footage of a plain crash?
no it wasn't that they were spectacles
not at all
that he had the courage to go inside life to the level he did
and sort of pull it out of itself
she maybe did that with her house making
(as she wrote about it)
but with her paintings - yes
the brakhage cat film i viewed at his memorial service here in nyc
was beautiful by all accounts
and though i refuse to show my cat film
i respect his on it's own as beauty
my point was a bias i questioned specifically dealing with fred
my experience with him 'biased' my reaction therefor
so
it is being confused that i am against brakhage making cat films
i am not
i am not against the film of agnes using a kid
i love the writings and work of both
what i am against is an authority on a subject not being realistic/inclusive about the subject - that is what i was questioning
i found out that the authority was much more inclusive than i thought
which is GREAT
and i wish the dialogue about that could be better known
and present-day documentaries or realistic portrayals of autopsies and childbirths surely beat what Brakhage could accomplish with his limited means, no?
no
first of all i do not think his means where so limited
- technically i think you mean -
i really don't see it that way
his 'limitations' may have created more art actually
plus again you are missing the artists mind (not brain) in your equation
and what that brings to fore
which is more than half of it i would say
All right, but that seems to go against your equation between Martin's kid and Brakhage's cat. Don't they each bring something different to the equation and to the fore - for better of for worse?
not to me
because as i said
[everyone please film a cat and a kid
(cute is hard for me but...)]
my issue isn't the films really
it is the critics possible bias
and the cultures lack of questioning
do you know the writing of robert smithson?
Some, yes. "Sedimentation of the mind", for example.
yes that is the specific essay i was referencing
there are imperfections in the ideas though perfection is not illusive like it/we want(s) to think it is
-m
__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
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__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.