Leading Lights – an evening of film and animation including works by Marie Menken, Ken Jacobs, Jordan Baseman and others
To coincide with the finissage of Steve Hollingsworth’s exhibition ‘nuomena – neomena’, SEVERAL PURSUITS presents a programme of historical and contemporary film and video exploring notions of presence in space through light and sound, narration and abstraction.
SEVERAL PURSUITS @ Lobeckstrasse 30-35 (VH / 1.OG – Access through backyard) on Saturday, 17th October 2009. Exhibition open 2 pm until 7 pm. Screening starts at 7 pm – duration approx 1 h. Entrance is free – all welcome.
Hans Richter
Rhythmus 21, 1921
16 mm transferred to dvd, 3 min 30 sec, b&w
‘In this first of the series, originally known as ”Film ist Rhythmus”, Richter experiments with square forms. These forms appear in very simple to very complex compositions-from the beginning shots where the squares with the frame. The effect is a subversion of the cinematic illusion of depth. Richter creates a precise rhythm with the movement of these shapes. “The simple square of the movie screen could easily be divided and “orchestrated,” wrote Richter in 1953. “These division or parts could then be orchestrated in time by accepting the rectangle of the ‘movie canvas’ as the form element. In other words, I did again with the screen what I had done years before with the canvas. In doing so I found a new sensation: rhythm- which is, I still think, the chief sensation of any expression of movement.” ‘ (Jonas Mekas)
Thorsten Fleisch
Kosmos, 2004
16 mm, 5 min 11 sec, colour, sound
KOSMOS consists of crystals grown directly on the film material. The crystals refract the light, the fundamental ingredient of cinema, creating a rich visual texture, reflecting both the mythical aspect of the crystals as well as their mineral, physical and chemical elements. This film is also a direct, haptical cinematic experience.
Ken Jacobs
Capitalism: Child Labor, 2006
digital video, 14 min, colour, sound
Music: Rick Reed
‘A stereograph celebrating factory production of thread. Many bobbins of thread coil in a great sky-lit factory space, the many machines manned by a handful of people. Manned? Some are children. I activate the double-photograph, composer Rick Reed suggests the machine din. Your heart bleeding for the kids? The children will surely be rescued and by their bosses! ”Boys,” they will say, ”Have we got a war for you.”‘ (K.Jacobs)
Jordan Baseman
Joy on Toast, 2007/2008
16mm transferred to dvd, 13 minutes, colour, sound
Courtesy of Matt’s Gallery London and the artist.
Joy on Toast features 82 year old botanical explorer Sheila Collenette. We hear Sheila describing her experiences collecting herbarium specimens for the British Museum, Kew Gardens and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh. Sheila spent 16 years collecting in Borneo and 26 years collecting in Saudi Arabia. The work is beautiful, funny, exotic and frightening, yet tinged with sadness as Sheila looks back on her dynamic life.
Marie Menken
Lights, 1964/65
16mm, color, silent, 6 min.
Marie Menken paints with the lights in the nights shortly before christmas, and her dancing light-images full of joy transform reality – everything is just motion and light. An ode to filming. (Ute Aurand)
Further information on the artists
Jordan Baseman (USA/UK) *1960
http://www.jordanbaseman.co.uk/
http://www.mattsgallery.org/
Thorsten Fleisch (D) *1972
http://fleischfilm.com/
Ken Jacobs (US) *1933
http://www.ubu.com/film/jacobs.html
http://www.eai.org/eai/artistBio.htm?id=6877
Marie Menken (US) 1910 – 1970
http://www.ubu.com/film/menken.html
http://hcl.harvard.edu/hfa/films/2009janfeb/menken.html
Hans Richter (D) 1888 – 1976
http://www.ubu.com/film/richter.html
Big thanks to / Herzliches Dankeschön an Jordan Baseman, Guillaume Cailleau, Thorsten Fleisch, Nanna Heidenreich, Ken Jacobs, Tanya Leighton, Kirsteen Macdonald, William Rose and John Smith, Arsenal Film Verleih & Landesfilmdienst Berlin-Brandenburg.
Film selection: Pauline Hanson
Image: Courtesy of the Menken Estate