Archives de catégorie : Ateliers, conférences, enseignement- Worshops, lectures, teaching

Social Scourge : Before and After New Queer Cinema.

24 Septembre 2022 Cinematek de Bruxelles, Festival L’âge d’or,

Durant l’Âge d’Or Festival, Our Story accueille le cinéaste, programmateur et curateur yann beauvais, à l’occasion d’une masterclass et d’une série de projections centrées sur une pratique « doublement mineure » (comme l’écrit Antoine Idier) : le cinéma queer expérimental. Co-fondateur, dans les années 1980, avec Miles McKane, de Light Cone et de Scratch (Paris), puis, en 2011 de Bcubico avec Edson Barrus (Recife), celui pour qui « présenter et promouvoir les œuvres des cinéastes » semble « aussi naturel que tenir une caméra et filmer » n’a jamais cessé d’écrire et de partager sur ce cinéma de l’oblique. Hybridations technologiques et expanded cinema, found footage, cinéma du corps et de l’intime… quelles sont les généalogies, les singularités ou les tactiques de ces expérimentations queer ? Comment participent-elles à nous rendre « producteur·ice·s des images qui nous représentent » ; à nous placer, non plus « à côté de l’écran, mais à l’écran » ?

An overview of queer practices in film and video before and after the New Queer Cinema, and how these practices have modified our use of cinema, and how our perception has been transformed by the expansion of cinema.

Publié dans LE TEMPS AVEC NOUS / DE TIJD MET ONS / TIME WITH US

publication coordinators : Iris Lafont, Valérie Leclercq, Christophe Piette CIMEATHEK, Brussels 2023

Masterclass : a militancia pelo cinema e o papel do artista

Aula Magna – Maya Deren: a militância pelo cinema e o papel do artista
Com Yann Beauvais

Ciclo de palestras Maya Deren Sesc Sao Paulo 29 avril 2022,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0tTzIbta2s

Atividade de abertura do projeto « Programa Maya Deren », a Masterclass de Yann Beauvais vai abordar questões relativas ao ativismo de Maya Deren no campo cinematográfico como as estratégias envolvidas na produção e, sobretudo, na distribuição de seus filmes. Escrever sobre seus próprios trabalhos, exibi-los e colocar-se à disposição do público para discuti-los eram atitudes que faziam parte daquilo que Deren entendia como sendo a função do artista/cineasta. Será traçado um paralelo entre seu modo de atuar e o de Germaine Dulac, outra cineasta que se notabilizou pelo seu engajamento em prol do cinema, incluindo no que tange a pensar estratégias de difusão das obras. A atividade também abordará de que maneira as iniciativas de Maya Deren influenciaram distribuidores como Jonas Mekas e Amos Vogel.

Ateliers, conférences, enseignements/ Workshops, lectures, teaching

2021

Présentation de l’exposition Dead Souls de Derek Jarman, Credac, suivit d’une présentation et débat autour de The last of England, cinema le Luxy, 12 décembre

Journée mondiale de lutte contre le sida rencontre avec Bloum Cardenas, Willy Rozembaum, yann beauvais et Antoine Idier,  le collectif 06 Lutte contre le siad et les Ouvreurs , MAM Nice 1 décembre

Activating the Cinema From the Margins. A Possible Introduction to Cinema Experimental, Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo, 18 Festival de Sevilla, 9/10 novembre

Oficina Danças Urbanas em Foco, Funarpe, Consuldao Francese no Recife, 3 -28 Setembre

2020

Oficina Práticas numéricas Videodança, Funarpe, Cosuldao Francese no Recife, 1 au 24 juillet, 5 /26 novembre

Visiting teacher, Alba, Beyrouth 7-13 janvier

2019 

Oficina Imagem, Movimento e Dança com yann beauvais e Moacir dos Anjos, Porto Midia  19 de Setembro 2019 Recife                                                                                                                                             Expérimenter, Les représentations publiques du Sida 6ème journée d’étude, Mucem, Marseille 24 mai                                                                                                                                                                    Résidence Soma, Mexico 29 avril 11 mai,                                                                                                    Miercoles de Soma, Mexico 8 mai,                                                                                                              retro virus todo este tiempo videoarte + activismo + VIH, La Cueva Mexico 4 mai                           Visiting Teacher Otis College Los Angeles 29 mars 10 avril                                                                 Workshop Teo Hernandez, Villa Vassilief & ENSAPC, Villa Vassilief, Paris 18 -22 Février

2018-19 Profesor Film-vidéo à l’Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts de Paris Cergy

2017

A estética do tempo na Imagen, Curso de curadoria de fotográfia ano IV, por yann beauvais, 28 de Agosto, 1 de setembro, 3emeio, Museu da Cidade de Recife, Forte das Cincos Pontas, Recife

Mesa redonda e apresentação Forum do movimento das imagens,Caixa economica Centro Cultural, 3 e meio, 27-29 julho, Recife

yann beauvais « un cinéma très élargi » Patrick Javault reçoit yb en compagnie de Miquel Mont,  31 mai, Fondations d’entreprise Ricard, Paris

Alchimie et Matière filmiques : Jurgen Reble Avec Yann Beauvais, Olivier Schefer, 18 mai, Le Bal, Paris

Professeur à l’ENSAPC

2016

Europe Versus America, yann beauvais Jonas Mekas, Filming in the moment The Diary Film Festival, Exit 7,  23 -27 novembre Guling Street Avant-Garde Theatre Taipei

Uma aproxima al cine de vanguardia: entre lo estrutural y la improvisacion, 8 Novembre, Facultad de bellas artes, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, La Plata

Forum do Movimento da Imagens, 25-27 mai, Caixa Cultural, Recife   

La lengua de Teo, introduction à la projection, Rencontres à la Villa Vassilieff, 23 avril, Paris      

Marx en Scène, Art et Capital Isaac Julien et Zachary Formalt, 14 avril, Le Bal, Paris

SonImage École des beaux arts Tours / Angers / Le Mans, 23-24 & 25 mars, École supérieure des beaux-arts d’Angers

2015

Table ronde Lançamento Autobiografias do outro, avec Márcio de Andrade, Rodrigo Caseiro, Eric Laurence, yann beauvais, Auditorio do MAMAM, 10 dec, Recife
1° Forum Movimento de Imagens, Itinérancia, Cinemateca MAM, Risco cinema, 7 dec, Rio de Janeiro      Debate com Rose Lowder, Mateus Araújo, yann beauvais, Cinemateca MAM, RISCO cinema, 5 dec, Rio de Janeiro                                                                                                                                                                Table Ronde 1° Forum Movimento de Imagens, avec Rose Lowder, Moacir dos Anjos, yann beauvais, AliançaFrancesa, 30 nov, Recife
Journée  Intervention post diplôme École Supérieure européene de l’image de Poitiers , à Paris le 27 octobre
Ce qui fait l’image, ce que fait l’image, École des beaux arts Tours Angers Le Mans, 20 & 21 octobre, Tours
Fazer o Mundo Fazendo Video 3- 4 e 10-11 de Outubro, Petrobras/Ação Darmata, Gaibu
Som-Imagem ou Imagem do som  3 – 6 de Agosto 2015 4° modulo do ciclo Estudos do som, Sesc Centro de Pesquisa e Formação  São Paulo http://centrodepesquisaeformacao.sescsp.org.br/atividade/estudos-do-som
Mesa redonda sobre O New Queer Cinema, sua relação com a história, política e a historiografia  do cinema, com Hernani Heffner, yann beauvais e Mateus Nagime, Caixa Cultural, Rio de Janiero 11/06/2015
Fazer o Mundo Fazendo Video, 28 e 29 Março, Petrobras/Ação Darmata, Gaibu
Mesa redonda sobre o cinema estrutural, com Carlos Adriano, yann beauvais e Patricia Mourão, Caixa Cultural, Rio de Janeiro 24/01/2015

2014

Mesa redonda sobre a exposição yb150213: 40 anos de yann beauvais 25/11/2014 Mamam no Pátio, Recife, Pe    http://bcubico.com/mesa-redonda-sobre-a-exposicao-yb150213/  http://bcubico.com/maria-do-carmo-nino/
Au commencement était le bruit… Steina et Woody Vasulka, 10 octobre Espace multimédia Gantner, Bourogne
Un regard sur une pratique du cinéma décadré, yann beauvais,  Les conférences de la presqu’Ile, 8 octobre,  Esam Caen/Cherbourg
Rencontre avec yann beauvais,  Ecole Supérieure d’arts et médias,8 octobre, Caen/Cherbourg     Seminário Musica Visual,  CALH, UFRB,  10 e 17 Setembro, Cachoeria, Bahia
Derek Jarman : O super 8, a homossexualidade e o cinema de pequeno gestos, Palestra em Cinema é Liberdade Derek Jarman, Caixa Cultural Recife, 16 de Agosto
História e Linguagem do vídeo,  Escola Pública de Audiovisual da Vila das Artes, 21-25 julho, Vila das Artes, Fortaleza
Ciclo Tempo das Imagens, cada 15 dias,  22 de Maio até  28 de setembro, B3 Recife
Cinema Expandido e Film de Found Footage, Abril 22-25, Picnic, Casa da Cultura, Teresina  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aoF0OfH6G0
Keith Sanborn em Contexto, B3 Abril 10, Recife

2013

Jonas Mekas e o filme-diário, Mesa, yann beauvais & Mateus Aráujo Silva, Mediação Carla Maia e Carla Italiano, Forum Doc BH 2013, ciné Humberto Mauro, 26 de novembro, Belo Horizonte         Malcolm LeGrice em contexto, B3, 11 de Julho, Recife
Seminario O tempo das Imagens ciclo de 12 palestras, Fundaj, Fundação Joaquim Nabuco, Recife http://bcubico.com/category/tempo-das-imagens-palestras/
Valie Export em Contexto B3, 16 de Maio, Recife
De la représentation intermittente de soi à la dévoration, Les intermittences du Sujet, Université de Haute Alsace, 5 abril, Mulhouse
Vidéos et films du Brésil, ENSBA 2 abril, Paris
Sharits em Contexto, B3, 14 de Março, Recife
Mesa Redonda, Ciclo Jonas Mekas, Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, 7 Fevereiro, São Paulo

2012

O uso do filme de found footage no cinema experimental e na videoarte , 9-13 abril, Vila das Artes, Fortaleza
Ciclo de aulas, do cinema experimental ao digital, B3, Recife

2011

Entre o cinema e a sala de exposição, semana de videoarte 2011, Fundação Joaquim Nabuco, Recife  Júri de seleção da IV Único , Exposição: Tecnobrasilidades, Galeria de Artes Sesc Casa Amarela, Recife

2010

Atelier L’écrit, la lettre dans l’espace, Ecole Supérieure des Beaux-Arts d’Angers
Introdução ao Cinema experimental,
– O que é o cinema experimental,
– Paul Sharits,
– O uso dos filmes de found footage, 12 Festival Intenacional Curtas, Belo Horizonte
Remont(r)er une installation de Paul Sharits, in Archimages 10, Institut National du Patrimoine Auditorium Colbert, Paris
José Agrippino de Paula et le tropicalisme, in Le tropicalisme, Parole au cinéma, table ronde avec Edson Barros, Guy Brett, Dominique Dreyphus, Centre Pompidou, Paris
Atelier Ecritures Cinématographique, Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris, 7 semaines
Gay Brazilian Cinema, I am curious : Pink ! OFFoff Art Cinema, Gent
Notes From Land to City, Kunstraum Walcheturm, Zurich 

2009

La couleur au cinéma, Chroma, Musée d’art moderne et contemporain de Strasbourg,
from scratch ? conférence inaugurale Xperimenta 09 Contemporary Glances at Experimental Cinema, CCCB, Barcelona : 
http://www.yannbeauvais.fr/article.php3?id_article=491
Atelier Ecritures cinématographiques, Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts de Paris, 9 semaines

2008

Pour un usage contemporain du found footage, Ecole nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts de Bourges
Paul Sharits, Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts, Paris
Artist Talk, Smolny Institute of Free Arts and Sciences, St Petersburg State University, Saint Petersburg
A representação do gay dentro do filme e vídeo experimentais brasileiro desde os anos 70 até os dias de hoje, in Retratos do Brasil homossexual, IV Congresso ABEH, USP São Paulo
O filme de viagem, entre cadernos de notas, colonialismo e subjectividade, PUC, Rio de Janeiro

2007

Paul Sharits, Officina da Luz, São Paulo
Robert Breer, Kuntshalle, Basel
Paul Sharits, Espace Multimédia Gantner, Bourogne
About my film works, American University in Paris
Paul Sharits, Universidade Pontificale PUC, Rio de Janeiro
On The use of Found Footage in Some of My Films, Nederland Filmuseum, Amsterdam
Robert Nelson , Musée d’Art moderne et Contemporain, Strasbourg
Robert Nelson, École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts de Paris

2006

Cinépoésie, in 7ème Festival de Poésie et d’Art Contemporain écritures visuelles et multimédias, CAPC Musée, Bordeaux
Visual Arts illustrated Lecture. yann beauvais, Stewart Film Theater, Princeton University
Visiting artist, Massachussets School of Arts, Boston
Cycle de présentation paysage urbain, La filature, Mulhouse
Universidade Pontificale PUC, une semaine d’atelier, Rio de Janeiro
Robert Breer, L’index, MAC/VAL, Vitry sur Seine
Dialogue avec Keith Sanborn, Ecole Supérieure d’Art, le Quai, Mulhouse
Rencontre avec Keith Sanborn, Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts, Paris
Atelier d’une semaine pour les post-diplômes en architecture et paysages Zurichg, Swiss Féderal Institut of Technology, Zurich

2005

Hélio Oticica & Jack Smith, Res do Chao, Açugar Invertido, Rio de Janeiro
Rencontre avec les étudiants de 3 années de l’Ecole Supérieure des Beaux Arts de Tours
The Digital ®evolution in its First Decade, Golden Horse Film Festival, Taipei
From film to installation, Shih Hsin University, Taipei
Cinéma expérimental et vidéo Brésilienne, Université de Metz
Atelier d’une semaine pour les post diplômes en architecture et paysages Zurichg, Swiss Féderal Institut of Technology, Zurich
Found Footage, University van Amsterdam
Films d’artistes, JAP, La Raffinerie, Bruxelles
From film to installation works, USF in Paris

2004

Contemporary Chinese videos, Kino Arzenal, Berlin

The art of programming, HBK Braunschweig

Expanding cinéma, Jap, palais des Beaux Arts, Bruxelles

Montar/ Samplear, PUC, Rio de Janeiro

Introduction to Experimental Film, Festival de Inverno de Pôrto Alegre

Expériences sonores et films expérimentaux, in Du muet au parlant Auditorium du Louvre, Paris

Vacataire à l’école des Beaux arts de Mulhouse, Le Quay

Introduction to my film work, University of South Florida in Paris

L’intime comme moment du multiple in L’intime sous tension, Carré d’art Nîmes

Atelier d’une semaine pour les post diplômes en architecture et paysages Zurich, Swiss Féderal Institut of Technology

Ecole nationale supérieure d’Art de Nancy

Vidéo brésilienne, autour de res do chao, Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts, Paris

Expandéd. cinema, University van Amsterdam

Rencontre autour de David Wojnarowicz, FNAC Forum, Paris

Créateur un, Auteur zéro, Institut Franco-Japonais de Tokyo

Sampling et Found Footage, Alliance Française Osaka

Vidéos contemporaines chinoises, Forum des images, Paris

2003

Vacataire à l’Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Mulhouse, Le Quay

films et vidéos de chine (s), Ecole nationale superieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris

Valie EXPORT, Centre National de la Photographie

Rencontres et débats autour de l’installation tu, sempre, Espace Mutimédia Gantner,

de la musique à l’image, de l’image aux sons, Espace Mutimédia Gantner, Bourogne

found footage and sampling in avant-garde films, University van Amsterdam

table ronde Institut franco-japonais, Tokyo

Des Rives, rencontre avec yb et Thomas Köner, Musachino Art University, Tokyo

The Last of England, Eurozone, la filature, Mulhouse

Autour du film est déjà commencé, Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Poitiers

Approriation par échantillonage, in La question de l’auteur, université  d’Amiens

Performance et attitudes, Ecole supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Tours

2002

Vidéo et sida, musée d’art contemporain et moderne, Strasbourg

Décadrer le cinéma, UFR Arts PLAstique, Paris VIII, St Denis

Expérimentation en cinéma, Université Paul Sabatier, Toulouse

Escola de Artes Visuais do Parque Lage, Rio de Janeiro

Taiwan, Academy of Arts, Taipei

Dai Yeh University, Chang-Hwa

Shih Hsin University, Taipei

National Taipei  Teachers College, Tapei

Workshop musique & film, Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Mulhouse

Éditing Sampling in avant-garde films and music, University van Amsterdam

L’appropriation, Ecole de l’Image, d’Angoulême

Le cinéma élargi, Ecole nationale des Beaux-Arts de Lyon

2001

Echantillonage contemporain, Ecole d’Art de Pau

yann beauvais, TNB Université de Rennes 2

le cinéma expérimental, une pratique, UFMR Créteil

Expérimentation en cinéma, Université Paul Sabatier, Toulouse

Symposium « section film », :Le quai, Ecole supérieure d’art de Mulhouse

Contemporary issues in presenting avant-garde films, University van Amsterdam

Ecriture, support, Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts, Paris

Le cinéma japonais, Galerie Faux mouvement, Metz

Mathématique et cinéma, Goethe Institut, Lille

Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Rennes

Du found footage, atelier, Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Dunkerque

Artiste en Résidence, Université de Rennes 2

Le crédac, Ivry

ENSET, Toulouse

2000

Ecole Supérieure d’Art et de Design, Reims

Artiste en Résidence, Université de Rennes 2

Expérimentation en cinéma, Université Paul Sabatier, Toulouse

Institute of Technoloy, class of Stephanie Maxwell, Rochester

Concordia University, class of Nelson Henricks, Montréal

Rencontres à partir du remake d’une conférence d’Hollis Frampton, Ensci, Paris

Domus Academy, Milano

Rencontre sur le cinéma italien, Link, Bologna

De l’un à la série, Paris 1, St Charles

recyclage/échantillonage, intervention de y b à propos de sa sélection vidéo, Créd.ac Ivry

Cinéma expérimental, Soirée du Capitaine Pip, Brétigny

Le cinéma expérimental, 4 journées, Luminy, Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Marseille

Le cinéma expérimental, Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Metz, Frac Lorraine

Cinéma d’avant-garde, Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Besançon

1999

Cinéma expérimental :cinéma des plasticiens, avec Jean Michel Bouhours, Miguel Mont, ENSBA, Paris

Workshop, ENSAV, Genève

Cinéma expérimental en France, Cinémathèque de Taiwan, Taipei

Le cinéma expérimental, Université de Taipei

Séminaire cinéma expérimental (1 semaine), Sam Spiegel Film &Video School, Jerusalem

Jean Genet et le ciné ex, 10 festival Théâtre & cinéma, Magic Cinéma Bobigny

Experimental film, First avant-garde to the 60’s, Cinémathèque de Jérusalem

Experimental film, 60’s to nowdays, Cinémathèque de Jerusalem

De Fluxus au cinéma expérimental contemporain, Milan et Link Bologna

Expérimentation en Cinéma, Vidéochroniques, Le miroir, Marseille

1998-99

Cinéma expérimental depuis les années 50, Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris 3

1998

Cinéma expérimental : engagement ou recherche formelle, Institut français, Tokyo

Light Cone, Cinéma ex en France, Image Forum, Tokyo

Cinex en France, Tokyo University of Art & Design, Nippon Engineering College, Tokyo

Cinex en France, Kyoto University of Art and Design, Kyoto College of Arts

Du cinéma en France, Institut français du Kansai

Trois cinéastes, Kobé Design University

Cinex en France, Kobé Art Center

Du cinéma en France, Alliance française Sapporo

Les art du je, Instituts supérieurs des Arts Plastiques, Lorient

Cinéma & arts plastiques, queer politics, scratchez vous, Université Paris 8

Intervenant, 5 cours, Studio Le Fresnoy

Support et cinéma, Futura, Musée d’Art Contemporain, Lyon

Le cinéma contemporain, Galerie des Filles du Calvaire, Paris

1997-98

Cinéma expérimental et arts plastiques, Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris 3

Intervenant, Ecole des Beaux Arts et du désign de Reims

1997

Artecinema Tmesa redonda, com Artur Omar, Annette Michelson, Ismael Xavier,Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, Rio de Janeiro

Rencontre avec Jonas Mekas, Forum, Fnac St Lazare, Paris

Expérimentation En Cinéma 3, 2 interventions, IRIT Université Paul Sabatier, Toulouse

New Queer Cinema, Les gays savoirs en Europe, les Revues Parlées, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris

L’autobiographie, le journal intime, Ecole des Beaux-Arts d’Angoulême

De Robert Frank à Andy Warhol, Collège de l’histoire de l’art cinématographique, Cinémathèque française, Paris

Hyper Média, Le cinéma expérimental et la production non linéaire, Oberhausen

Kenneth Anger, Le Mélies et le 102, Grenoble

1996-97

Cinéma expérimental et arts plastiques, Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris 3

Intervenant, Ecole des Beaux-Arts et du désign de Reims

1996

Le Found Footage, Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris

Le cinéma expérimental, Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris

Expérimentation EN Cinéma 2, Science en Fête, Université Paul Sabatier, Toulouse

Le cinéma autrichien, Institut autrichien, Paris

The Baudelerean Cinema, Impakt, Utrech

Peter Kubelka, Université de Paris I

Found Footage and Documentaries, Oberhausen Film Festival

Musique Film, Université de Lille

Jonas Mekas, American Center

Les journaux filmés, Cinémathèque de Roumanie, Bucarest

1995

Vidéos et cinéma expérimental quels rapports ?, Atelier Heure exquise, Lille

Un aspect du cinéma expérimental des années 70 à aujourd’hui, cycle de conférences Ecole des Beaux Arts Luminy, Marseille

Le cinéma comme art, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Lyon

Andy Warhol Télévision, Université d’été L’art vidéo, Arts plastiques et Audiovisuels, la Saison Vidéo, Lille

Found Footage, Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris

Andy Warhol Cinéma, European Méd.ia Art Festival, Osnabrück

Queer Cinema, autour de Zero Patience, Le cinéma, Lyon

Fast Trip, Long Drop, Info Sida Services, Grenoble

Le montage dans le cinéma expérimental et la vidéo, Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris

1994

Le cinéma expérimental, Champs Magnétiques,Vidéothèque de l’Acquitaine Bordeaux.

Questions d’identités, Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris

Le cinéma expérimental, Mire, Médiathèque Nantes

Arts plastiques et cinéma expérimental, Université d’été L’art vidéo,

Arts plastiques et Audiovisuels, la Saison Vidéo au Goethe Institut de Lille

La distribution du cinéma expérimental en Europe Light Cone, Osnabruck

L’homosexualité dans le cinéma de Warhol, American Center, Paris

1993

Fade to black, Eldorado, Anwerpen

Summer School, avec Jurgen Reble, Stuc Leuven, Anterwepen 93 (1semaine)

Musique Film, A.V.E, Arnhem

Fade to black; Rialto, Amsterdam

Le Musical, Eldorado, Project Experimental Film Antwerpen 93

1992

Aspects contemporains, Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts de Paris.

Germaine Dulac, Festival Int. de films de Femmes de Créteil

Summer University in Paris, Rochester Institut, 6 semaines

Queer Cinema Conference, ICA, Londres

Rencontre avec Jonas Mekas, Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris

1991

Workshop, Artspace, Auckland, ILAM School of Fine Arts Canterberry University

Point de vue des coopératives et d’un cinéaste, Congrès de la F.I.A.F. Athènes

Summer University in Paris, University of South Florida, Art Institue of San Francisco,  : Visiting Artist, University of South Florida, Tampa Jan/ Mai

1990

Laszlo Moholy Nagy et Len Lye, Maison de l’Image Marseille.

1989

Cinéma des plasticiens cinéma expérimental, Crac Valence

1988

Tendances Contemporaines, Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Paris

1987

Workshop Plastic Montage, Auckland University, School of Fine Arts N.Z.

1986

Musique/Film, LukasInstitut Bruxelles

Musique/Film, Université Le Sérail Toulouse

1984

Musique/Film, Ecole des Arts Décoratifs Paris

1982-96

Introduction de nombreuses programmations de films

1978-79

Conférencier Musée National d’Art Moderne

From Scratch? (Eng)

Opening lecture, Xperimenta 09, Contemporary Glances at Experimental Cinema, Centro de Cultura Contemporana de Barcelona, 02-26-2009 Barcelona

FROM SCRATCH?

Describing the situation  of experimental film in Vancouver in the 1980s, Al Razutis had this to say: “There’s a lot of people who went through the process and vanished, whose work in its time was just as important as those who are remembered in the 80’s today. It’s a rear guard thinking that doesn’t account for the networks of influence as they’re played out at the time. I think a lot of stuff has gone down unsung and unknown and it’s terrible. [1]”
When creating Light Cone with Miles McKane, I was not thinking along these lines, but somehow the setting of the cooperative encompassed these issues among others, that had to do with local matters, such as the difficulty to access contemporary and historical woks on a daily basis and outside the festival scheme, in order to see the unseen.
As Keith Sanborn remarked in the late 80’s “films are born dead” and need to be reanimated through distribution and screening. When Light Cone was created it seemed particularly useful to establish a positive field for experimental cinema: to create the means to give access to new works and to works that we had only heard of through distribution and exhibition. These were our initial goals.
One important effect to this was to put experimental film back on the agenda of the museum. Even if it was already within the concerns of a museum, such as Centre Georges Pompidou, our aim was to put these films back within the context of art. At the beginning, this was not easy, but this moved slowly, somehow, to a kind of simultaneous recognition by the academy and by the art world. But was this for the best? Has it duplicated and maximized a canonical view of those films? A view, which duplicates as a parody, the world economy calling for a paternalist approach to any kind of otherness: a sort of cultural neocolonialism.
It seemed important at that time, as it is still now days, in a different way, to look for the unseen, the unknown or the underestimated, the marginalized. But Light Cone was created in the eighties, something like thirty years ago. Today it seems necessary to convey and have access to the unofficial, the underground, which means to look for “otherness,” in all possible meaning, as much as, to look-at it in a different way. One must understand that, for roughly the past 15 years, the experimental film scene has become part of art history as much as cinema history, which was not always the case. At festivals, historical exhibitions are either devoted to a theme such as abstract film, calculated films, found footage films and so on, or an aspect is investigated such as expanded cinema, sampling, performances. Simultaneously, avant-garde studies have become routine -not as developed as cultural studies- but it is on its way. For long the area has been a territory reserved for specialists: mostly the filmmakers themselves and a very few historians and critics.
Experimental film has become a genre in itself. Within the industry, if someone gives you credit for an “experimental touch” you get a positive appreciation (plus-value) and who knows, maybe a box office hit within the independent film scene. We have seen a subtle shift in how experimental film is talked about: from derogatory to complimentary, at least in France  since the late 90’s. In both cases and maybe today even more, this will to standardize, one should understand, regulates or even homogenizes things to such a degree that “experimental film” practices dissolve into an unidentified field. This turn of event evokes what has happened to the gay community: the recognition of our rights has been the best way to promote or establish as a norm a perfect right to indifference. This use of tolerance is the best way to annihilate any radical drive. As a filmmaker, and as a gay I do see a lot of similarities in these recognition practices that are promoted in order to depoliticize the “other.”

It goes without saying that in both cases what is privileged is some characteristics or singularities to the detriment of its recognition as “other.” Another talk might be given, declaring that it was about time to recognize these practices existed and therefore include them in the on-going spectacle. The more it’s included, the more it dissolves into the culture industry. Of course, it seemed outrageous that experimental filmmakers were regarded as second tier artists. Most of us have experienced this when selling prints to museums. I could speak for myself but prefer to refer to this through a letter that Paul Sharits wrote to the Wallraf-Richartz Museum, Köln in 74. Already describing this phenomenon through the standard applied to artists showing their films and filmmakers. Guess who is second rate? “To begin with, I would like to know why Michael Snow is listed and treated as a “filmmaker” while Jack Smith is listed as an “artist”. It is no secret that Snow is an accomplished and respected artist in numerous media and Jack Smith is an accomplished and respected artist only in film, slide and performance…. Furthermore, I have learned that “artists showing their films are receiving gallery sale prices for prints while “filmmakers” are receiving a mere 3DM per minute rental of their works. [2]” This division (of labor) still obtains. If you have not succeeded in entering the gallery world and the art market, you can always dream. Dreams that money can buy, (here not filmed by Hans Richter) has become the way most “films by artists” are made, duplicating the Hollywood schema, but without the ability to match its standard. The common denominator being the money spent to make the work. This fascination with cost, with the latest high tech devices to make the films, shows how far away we are from the impulse of many of the underground filmmakers of the sixties and after. The impetus to resist the Hollywood standard is nowhere to be seen, what is at stake is mostly the mirage of this dream factory. This dream factory has succeed in colonizing our imaginary to such an extent that it appears there is no alternative to it. This use of film by most artists is often directed toward the black box or the white cube, but not so often the theater. This shift toward concern with filmic reception induces, not to say promotes, indifference toward projected images. If this were really the case, it would be rather interesting because it would be the mark of a “demy(s)tification of the sacred image. It would connected to the use of image by designer when using motion graphic or architect, for which processing determined or indefinite processes procedures are the main objects disqualifying our image cult. These procedures share some aspects of what was achieved with “structural cinema”, with some of the films of the Whitney brothers, or with pattern paintings.
But let’s go back to our black box and white cube, that have become the ultimate locations where one’s work can be projected or be seen. These locations transform the reception of a work through a variety of disturbances, which sometimes requires a totally immersive space, from which it is difficult to remove oneself. This immersion expands Peter Kubelka’s Invisible Cinema, but with a twist: it is not only the eyes and the ears that are required for the show. It could be much more. This box in which there appears films and dirt particles, mostly called for endless loops while the projected flow of images follows a traditional use of narrative. We are facing a displacement of reception but are not necessarily offer new means of structuring, or alternatives to dominant narratives. The box in itself explores practices where seeing and wandering within cinema take place, much as is the case with You Tube, Vimeo, DailyMotion, that are locations where cinema takes place as well. A point has to be made about works dealing precisely with Internet censorship through their use of specific filters or mode of exclusion such as in the case of youtube: flagging [3]. Chroma, a project created by Dominik Bartowski. [4], is a software that reshapes porn images in a way that used and subverted the censor filters. The software is user friendly in order to produce your own images that are part of this general recycling, recombining attitudes which have become prevalent in our everyday life.

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Not that we are seeing different films specific to each of these apparatuses, but something distinct is happening as Lev Manovich points out: “We have a revolutionary new means of content distribution, but… the content tends to remain the same: people write letters, people shoot video, people take photographs. [5].”But at the same time, one will notice that some of the things that reflected the personal cinema are becoming banal on those sites; the confessional drive, the diaries, the trick film are examples that come to mind. These small films on display in those sites follow the setting of television. We are facing a use of cinema through television, if we apprehend Cinema as the art of organizing a stream of audio-visual events in time. It is an event-stream like music [6] In this vast quantity of work, what will we looking at? What will attract our blasé glance? This incredible amount of work is a reflection of what is also going on within the film festival. Between what has been selected and what is available through the consulting library we would need weeks to look at all the work. Confronted with such incommensurability, we are left with potential regrets, frustration or contempt. Have I not missed the one film we have been waiting for. Confronted with that vast production, in which there might be some interesting works, how will I have access to the interesting ones? Does it matter any longer to have access to all the interesting works? One could consider that this wish belongs to a time when it was possible to know the history of cinema, despite the considerable amount you were able to have seen most of the work produced within this field. But first of all, this “encyclopedic” knowledge reflected a limited view of cinema, mostly western views; from it, very often, not to say systematically, other works were excluded, which were neither western, nor made according to the reigning set of optics in use. It is interesting in that respect to notice that the way we have shaped the history of experimental films duplicates the world economy. Europe, seeking to be the dominant force in the 20’s, the US from the 40’s onward engaged in a kind of self-aggrandizing cartography: to the map one had created, one would add new territory, new cinema practices according to a fascination with exoticism: an extensive colonialism or sectarianism. This issue has been dealt by filmmakers such as Trinh Minh-Ha and Lisl Ponger by focusing on ethnocentrism within travel films [7]. This project is based on tourist films; it rarely conveys the images and the sound of the others. (In déjà vu, we can hear the tale of Karim Duarte speaking about Cap Verdian Independence Day). At other times, we discover new territory and will screen, as a new trend, films coming from outside. One should remember our cyclical fascination with new territory in which we discover films only because we have been certain to have exhibited our own. This attitude is well described in the publication Cinema of Prayogain which this double movement is acknowledged: “on one part this exchange has been the movement of classic and contemporary work from the UK to packed audiences in India over the lat 5 years of the Experimental film festival” the other part being the publication which “reflects discoveries made under these circumstances and as such we believe it is a key text for beginning the process of challenging the dominant US and Euro-centric histories mainly known in the UK [8]” Among others I have been part of this trend, focusing on diverse cinematic lands according to friendships, encounters, love. It would be presumptuous to say “from scratch.

We should be aware of the fact that since the media piracy has increased and has given access to works which were not available in different countries for different reasons, censorship. As Tilman Baumgärtel put it : “While in Europe and the USA, piracy is mostly seen as an online phenomenon that takes place via peer-to-peer networks the pirate culture in Southeast Asia is informed by the fact that in many countries here people do not have acess to the internet or do not even have a computer of their own. Therefore the predominant form of piracy in the region is the sale of counterfeit DVDs and VCDs.” [9] This media piracy have increased the visibility of the international art house, experimental as well as porno films, and has transformed filmic knowledge by adding these territories. It functions as an educational tool, and can explained the eruption of new type of cinematography within such countries. Filmmaker such as Apichatpong Weerasetheakul is a good example or this interaction.

We are far from scratch.

I have always been curious of the lesser known, not to say the “unknown,” the different. This could have to do with a sexual drive but it would be a bit simplistic to reduce it to that. It seems there were always films that were referred to, but these films were never screened, or rarely, I thought it could be possible to give Light Cone and Scratch an opportunity to deal with these lost, unseen works. This explains the search for films in the 80’ such as the work of Len Lye, Laszlo Moholy Nagy, Germaine Dulac, Daniel Buren, Richard Serra, Carolee Schneeman, Anthony McCall, Jack Smith, Valie Export, and as well as for the work of lesser know individuals such as Alexandre Witkine, Eugene Deslaw, Adrian Brunel, José Rodrigo Solteiro, Nguyen Tan Haong, Wayne Yung… I could say that what was at stake was to produce and to give access to alternative paths within the history of experimental films. Not to forget the margins of the field, to dig them out in some way.

To this end, we will look at an extract from a Brazilian film made by the writer artist José Agrippino de Paula. The film is called Hitler 3° Mundo, [Hitler 3rd World], and was shot in 1969. It is the only 16mm film left by this filmmaker among a few super 8 films that he made later on, in Africa and Brazil in the 70’s. José Agrippino de Paula, is considered one of the main precursors of Tropicalism. His novels Lugar Público (1965) and PanAmérica (1967) and his play/happening: The United Nations (1968) are epic works annexing multilayered sources of icons and facts, such as pop had done in painting. Hitler 3° Mundo was mostly shot in São Paulo during the dictatorship, with the assistance of the filmmaker Jorge Bodansky as a cameraman. The film was based on a happening; Tarzan terceiro Mundo: Mustang Hibernado, made with the help of Maria Ester Stockler. One will immediately see the connections with the Living Theater, andThe Brig (filmed by Jonas Mekas) but as well with the work of Ron Rice and Jack Smith, and with that of the performers Taylor Mead and Jack Smith. What is of special interest and offers a lot to think about is to recognize how José Agrippino de Paula deals with and masters improvisation and chance, in a manner that recalls Jack Smith’s ability to work from improvisation. In both cases, these artists know how to take advantage of chance. In Hitler 3° Mundo, for example, while the man dressed as the thing is screaming from the top of a building, Zé Agrippino persuaded a group of soldiers and cops to arrest him and filmed his arrest without any authorization at a time when everyone else was trying to stay clear of the army (screening of an extract from 10’ to 15’)

hitler 3° Mundo
Cinema production has by now surpassed our ability to seize its entire scope. So we have to now find new ways of dealing with such a volume of production. The fact that production is more important doesn’t necessarily mean that the amount of strong work is also increasing; but it means that it might be more difficult to have access to it. To succeed in seeing works, we have to create a new kind of web, in order to connect to work. The film festival, a special screening presentation, might be a good opportunity to see works but it might not always be relevant. While a performance of live cinema or a site specific installation will always imply taking place directly, other filmic experience could be shared on different levels, despite the fact that we might lose, to not say dissolve the experience of the film’s grain and its unique pulse.
Mike Hoolboom said that film festivals stink of the mall: “too many shown all at once, one after another, all howling for attention like the Bargain Prices Reduced no Offer Too Low signs which greet me in the covered wagons of the shopping paradise. [10]” Indeed the festivals are one of our shopping malls, but they are not the only ones that deliver us to this mass of films. The Internet is busy covering the field. As said to Mike in response, “Avant-garde has become a programming category. But one wonders if avant-garde practices are still relevant within films today. Maybe the notion of the avant-garde and the way it has frozen a practice in a frozen genre is the main limitation to a renewal of film practices.” All the same, in the eighties and nineties, it has been important to develop visibility for works that renew the tradition of the avant-garde. And fortunately the understanding of such practices has shifted not only in regard to content strategies but mostly as regards origins. It is not the kingdom of westerners, or what westerners were fantasizing about it.
Globalization has hit culture as much as anything else, in some ways more rapidly than any other field. This is very stimulating because we don’t master what is available; we are in a wandering situation that evokes the way we walk through the mall as much as through the exhibition spaces. We are in a state of distracted attentiveness. The production being so huge, it has become more democratic. The way we were making such films belongs to different minorities such as races and gender(s). It is no longer the exclusive practice of the dominant powers: i.e. the west. The dominant power is no longer alone. Others have challenged it; different voices have erased white supremacy. In this case, the festival is no longer a place for celebration so much as a place to emphasize parallel routes. A festival becomes a collection of possibilities. It’s a network, a web. We go to festivals not so much to see films, as to meet and encounter people, in that sense the festival is like the opening within the art scene. The sheer quantity of works already implies further screening opportunities and so questions the means of any single festival. In a festival, one work follows another. This massing and the attention required to see work is (maybe) not the best at festivals. The way we have conceived of exhibition is obsolete, and we should think about new forms of giving access to the works.
Today transmission does not necessarily imply theatrical screening. It encompasses broadcasting and downloading. One has to deal with multiple channels of exhibiting a work, in order to create new space for film. We not only need to see works under proper conditions, but we need to think about what it means to make this type of work today. The amount of cinema is such that we have to create anew the conditions of reception for these works. We can’t keep on duplicating forever, the same horizon, as if cinema had reached an eternal form of display. Cinema is no longer what we have previously known. Cinema has become democratic, some will say perverted, to such an extent that it invades the city walls, the mall and any screen we have access to. Can we continue making and exhibiting the same type of works that belongs to a past epoch, to certain types of political, social and esthetic conditions? Can we sustain the same old fascination for a Work of Art as it was in a previous era? Can we still perpetuate this film form as duplication (reproduction) du Grand Œuvre according to canonical norms? Can we still display the same old history that excludes and protects more than it shares?
How much longer are we going to look at the same canonical history of film, as if there had not been any other makers, any other trends that have questioned this? The film archive category has been useful for a time, but to erect it as dogma to secure its eternity seems rather strange because it demonstrates what it was, but is not any longer. Frozen in its celebration, like any potentate, it can’t cope with differences. The inclusion of otherness reflects only a new twist to gain another chance for survival. Do we have to follow once again American history and its numerous sequels, where nationalism becomes the key word to oppose or confront domination. In order to promote another vision, we too often respond with similar strategies, therefore giving added attention to the object we are trying to critique. How are we going to proceed? Should we give cinema a chance, creating specific spaces to encounter projects, such as sites giving access to different schemas? Manifestons! Manifestons! for example is a You tube platform where we can look at works “without quality,” which no longer invests the ontology of the image with anything

manifestons youtube edson barrus

Other than its availability.

This proposal, Cecilia Cotrim [11] has rightly pointed out, resists the normative functioning of the contemporary cultural system, by focusing its effort on the creation and dissemination of daily writing. Expanding and torpedoing this notion of keeping a daily activity, focusing on one of its aspects sometimes absent from our daily life. It is the process that is asserted: the notion of dissemination and not so much the actual image. By playing the medium against itself, against the grain, the artist Edson Barrus is offering ways to think about our use and abuse of images. Similar experiences are produced when activism is geared toward political/social/aesthetic issues…
The diversity of approaches toward cinema offers the opportunity of opening new territory in which it might not be the theatrical moment, which is the most important, but a context from which, in which a work is given meaning. Some proposals of Keith Sanborn deal with these issues. Facing a proliferation of works we have to produce these moments, in which reflexivity as much as relation will give the work a dimension that a screening does not supply. We could run screenings from the web to which you subscribe, or with pod casting. It is how we can understand why so many filmmakers are now giving access to their films on different platforms, in order to emphasized this displacement. But we might well turn away from the “massification” of this culture, its spectacularization by staging anew modest forms of screenings as some of us have the habit of doing. To reshape the display of cinema by reinvestigating the private sphere to induce other behavior? We have to open the critical space, which seems to have disappeared. It seems more than necessary to invest such a critical space in which not only works are shown, but also in which works become not an end but a vector of critical studies. Does it mean that film for film sake is out of consideration? If, in 1992, it was useful to wonder about the production of new images to make films [12], one wonders today whether it is not the concept and practices of filmmaking in themselves which are still pertinent?
Experimental film and its contemporary practices are part of the cultural landscape and retain respected specific niches, expurgated of any claims to subversion, utterly sanitized. As if there were any way to politicize these practices. Searching for recognition we might have lost some of the determinant impulses within this practice that had to do with countering/opposing/subverting. Reification took place on different levels, but we can encounter the drive of such practices in other fields that have nothing to do with this fascination for ruins and with the domination of the archive of our lives.

From Scratch? Is this what we were born for?

“Films are born dead: they must be reanimated to be counted among the living. They pass most of their existences unseen, as inanimate bodies. There is something eerie in reviving them. For, in their inertness, films decay into oblivion, or by force of power they attract, become ritual objects of museological mysteries: unseen, unheard, sacred. [13]” Keith Sanborn
yann beauvais delivered on February 26th at CCCB Xperimenta 09


[1] Al Razutis Interviewed by Mike Hoolboom, in Inside The Pleasure Dome Fringe Film in Canada, Toronto, Gutter Press 1997

[2] Letter to Marlis Grüterlich 1974), in Paul Sharits, Ed yann beauvais Les presses du Réel, Dijon 2008

[3] Computing a variable used to indicate a particular property of the data in a record. Signaling. On the used of Flagging in You Tube, cf Flagging or Fagging (Self-)Censorship of Gay Content on Youtube, Minke Kampman in Video Vortex Reader, Responses to Youtube, ed by Geert Lovink and Sabine Niederer Ink reader #4, Amsterdam 2008, pdf at www.networkcultures.org/publications

[4] To have access to this project: http://online.impakt.nl and http://chromasoft.wordpress.com

[5] We Have Only Started Interview with Lev Manovich,J Hidding in The Cinematic Experience edited by Boris Debacker & Arie Altena, p 137

[6] Gene Youngblood: Cinema and the Code in Future Cinema The Cinematic Imaginary after Film p 156 Ed by Jeffrey Shaw and Peter Weibel, MIT Press 2003

[7] On this issue, see Tim Sharp in Ailleurs 3, Centre Culturel Suisse Paris 1999 andhttp://lislponger.com

[8] Brad Butler & Karen Mirza Preface in Cinema of Prayoga Indian Experimental Film & Video 1913-2006 A no.w.here Publication, London 2006.

[9] Media Piracy and Independent Cinema in Southeast Asia, in Video Vortex Reader, Responses to Yutube ed by Geert Lovink and Sabine Niederer Ink reader #4, Amsterdam 2008, pdf atwww.networkcultures.org/publications

[10] In Showing Pictures : A conversation with yann beauvais and Mike Hoolboom, 2008http://www.mikehoolboom.com/writing/essays/Showing%20Pictures.htm

[11] Querer a multidão, Cecilia Cotrim 2008

[12] It was Peter Tscherkassy in a round table in 1992 at the Viper Film Festival who was addressing this issue. This assertion was very stimulating for me at that time.

[13] Keith Sanborn: History, Necrology, Detection in Underexposed, Artists Space 1987

Robert Nelson : Quelques films (Fr)

présentation au Musée d’art Moderne et Contemporain de Strasbourg, 04-04-2007

Ce qui caractérise le cinéma de Robert Nelson c’est avant tout la multiplicité des approches qui jouent des genres cinématographiques. Robert Nelson commence à faire des films en 1963, à San Francisco. L’année 63, est importante dans le champ cinématographique indépendant puisqu’elle marque l’irruption à New York des premiers travaux d’Andy Warhol qui remettent en question le spectacle cinématographique.

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Robert Nelson après des études d’art à l’Art Institut de San Francisco se lie d’amitiés avec différents peintres dont William T. Wiley avec qui il réalise des films. Il fréquente Robert Hudson (sculpteur), et Robert Anerson. Tous feront partie de ce que l’on a désigné comme le mouvement California Funk des années 60. On comprend par là une production d’objets que l’on fait pour soi ou pour des amis elle n’a rien à voir avec une production artistique pour la galerie et le musée. C’est ainsi que Bruce Conner l’une des figures essentielles du collage et de l’assemblage de la côte ouest définie cet art Funk. Il deviendra ensuite l’un des cinéastes les plus influents du cinéma expérimental à travers ses films de found footage. L’art funk de Californie, c’est un art qui fait de bouts de ficelles, qui est informel qui fait appel au hasard et qui travaille l’humour.

Lorsqu’il réalise, (ce que l’on considère comme) son premier film : Plastic Haircut(1963) il est reconnu comme peintre, il a déjà à son actif plusieurs expositions de ses peintures. Ce film est une collaboration entre la troupe de Mime de San Francisco, fondée par Ron Davis, Bill Wiley et Steve Reich. Robert Nelson avait déjà vu quelques films d’avant-garde aussi savait-ce qu’il voulait faire avec ce film. Comme il le dit : « Je tournais plus d’une heure de film, mais cela semblait sans intérêt, car c’était tellement répétitif et long. Pendant des semaines je me débattais avec les rushes, mais quoi que je faisais c’était toujours chiant. Désespéré je commençais à couper de plus en plus dans le matériau ; plus les plans étaient courts mieux c’était, et quand je compris que cela donnait au film toute son énergie, je pris vraiment conscience de ce le montage pouvait bien être. [1] »
A cette même époque Steve Reich avec la troupe de mime de San Francisco est fit des pièces de musique pour des light shows ainsi que pour la pièce Ubu roi, pour lequel William Wiley fit les décors. Il réalise sa première pièce pour bande avec ce film. Pour ce film, il crée un collage sonore à partir d’un 33 tour narrant les grands moments du sport, pour lequel il enregistrait une courte section, arrêtait la bande, mettait l’aiguille du bras à un autre endroit, réenregistrait et ainsi de suite. La progression graduelle qui va de l’intelligible à l’inintelligible anticipe It’s Gonna Rains autant que Come Out.
Ce qui désole encore à ce jour Robert Nelson c’est qu’il ne savait pas comment faire des mixages à cette époque, aussi plaqua-t-il, le son de Steve Reich, sur de l’amorce noire, et non pas sur les images [2].
En 1965 il réalise pour Robert Nelson un canon en cinq parties pour Oh dem Watermelons (1965) [3] qu’il tira du spectacle de rue sur les stéréotypes raciaux de la troupe de mime de Ron Davis dans A Minstrel Show (Civil Rights from the Cracker Barrel). Cette musique est une nouvelle pièce pour trois voix et piano. La musique de Steve Reich est basée sur la fin de la messe de Steven Foster.

Oh Dem Watermelons

Oh dem Watermelons, semble partager l’esthétique des films de poursuites et des comédies du premier cinéma. Bien que Robert Nelson parle d’une influence inconsciente d’Un chien andalou pour ce film, c’est cependant le film à René Clair et Entr’acte autant qu’à certains comédies slapstick qu’on pensera plus qu’aux films de Sidney Peterson (The Cage). Oh dem Watermelons s’attache au stéréotype raciste. L’image du noir s’incarnait à travers la pastèque qui est le fruit qu’ils (les pauvres) dévoraient. Comme le reconnaissait dans les années 90, Robert Nelson lorsqu’il fit ce film dans les années 60, il travaillait sur des stéréotypes du passé, clichés réprimés qui surgissent bien souvent au détour d’une plaisanterie, ou par sous-entendus. « Je peux comprendre que des gens soient furieux avec ce film, mais il est à la limite. On ne peut tire une conclusion à partir de toutes ces images, le film devient ce que vous y projeter. Je n’ai jamais décidé de prendre la parole à mon compte et d’être un porte-parole quant au racisme. Mais il m’a été donner comme une opportunité que j’ai su saisir. » En effet Ron Davis m’a demandé si je pouvais réaliser une pièce d’entracte pour son show, sur les rapports entre les noirs et les blancs, je voulais choquer…
Signalons quelques moments important dans ce film qui est constitué selon un assemblage particulier qui mêle différents types de filmage, qui travaille de manière dynamique l’assemblage. On trouvera plusieurs séquences animées qui évoquent celles du StanVandebeck de Science Friction (1959) autant que celles de Robert Breer duMiracle (1954), dans lesquelles les collages de papiers et photographies sont animés de manière à accentuer l’humour à travers les saccades et à coups des mouvements L’ouverture du film est intéressante à plus d’un titre car après le générique, un plan d’une pastèque sur un terrain de sport est cadré pendant une longue durée, plus d’une minute, et semble retarder le déroulement du film.
La séquence dans laquelle on évide une pastèque de ses viscères partage un esprit surréaliste avec cette autre que l’on trouve dans Prune Flat (1965) de Robert Whitman et dans lequel des fruits et des légumes coupés font apparaître des plumes, des paillettes etc…
The Off-handed Jape (1967) est une autre co-réalisation avec William Wiley.
D’après Robert Nelson, « le film a été réalisé en quelques heures pour l’image autant que pour le son. Il présente une déclinaison d’expressions et de grimaces dans des mises en scènes et démonstrations du jeu d’acteur. » Cette même année il réalise un des grands films psychédéliques de l’époque ; The Grateful Dead (1967) qui est une manipulation des images du groupe, au son de titres de leur premier album. Cette même année il réalise une autre œuvre essentiel : The Great Blondino à partir de la figure de Blandin était un magicien et funambule au 19 siècle et qui traversa les chutes du Niagara en poussant une brouette ?

The Great Blondino

Ce film propose diverses déambulations dans San Francisco. Ce film évoque d’autres déambulation infantile ou presque comme celle que propose Ron Rice dans The Flower Thief (1960) ou même Ken Jacobs et Jack Smith dans leur film commun Star Spangled to Death 1958-60), et même Tarzan and Jane Regained sort of (1963) de Andy Warhol, qui tous mettent des protagonistes au polymorphisme infantile. S’agit-il d’une interprétation des années d’apprentissage d’un jeune Blondin qui à l’instar de Willem Meister voyage pour se découvrir.

Avec Bleu Shut (1970) ( Bull shit ?) Robert Nelson s’éloigne des films antérieurs, il s’inscrit dans un autre registre cinématographique, plus en phase avec le cinéma structurel et dans lequel le passage le temps est l’enjeu. A la différence de The Awful Backlash (1967) enregistrement continu du démêlage du fil d’une canne à pêche, et qui par sa facture : un plan fixe d’une dizaine de minutes, rappelle Fog Line (197 de Larry Gotheim ou Lemon d’Hollis Frampton, Blue Shut s’écarte d’une entreprise méditative au profit du jeu. En effet, ce film plein d’humour met en jeu un quiz pour une part, qui est une parodie à la fois des test à choix multiples que l’on retrouve aussi bien dans l’enseignement que dans les jeux télévisés.
Nous sommes immédiatement renseigné de la durée du film autant que du surgissement de différents évènements dans le cours du film. C’est ainsi qu’une horloge est placée dans le cadre. L’idée de cette horloge est venue à Nelson face à aux difficultés qu il éprouvait face à certains films expérimentaux. Comme il le dit « J’éprouve parfois l’impérieuse nécessité de regarder combien de temps il reste sur la bobine. Quand je succombe à la tentation de regarder en arrière, ce qui reste apparaît toujours énorme. J’ai mis l’horloge à l’écran afin que personne n’est besoin de se retourner. »

Blue shut
Le jeu qui consiste à deviner le nom des photos de bateaux de plaisance fonctionne à la fois comme une critique des jeux télévisés autant qu’il semble se moquer des dispositifs déployés par un nombre important de films du cinéma structurel, qui se prennent un peu trop au sérieux. Les séquences de devinettes sont entrecoupées avec une variété de séquences dans lesquelles le found footage domine. Elles proposent un panorama des styles, qui vont du film amateur porno en passant par des bandes d’actualités de toutes sortes dont le montage apparaît évoque A Movie (1959) de Bruce Conner. De même on remarquera le jeux de synchronisation et désynchronisation en boucle d’une des séquences qui nous montre un chien aboyant. La qualité du film réside dans la conjonction de l’horloge, des voix-off qui tentent de résoudre les énigmes du nom des bateaux, et la participation des spectateurs qui se prennent eux aussi au jeu, et qui appréhendent ainsi la temporalité du film de manière spécifique : la matérialité du film est éprouvée par le processus défini par le jeu.
Le film implique le spectateur selon différents niveaux : : la participation au moyen du jeu, l’anticipation par l’horloge et l’entrain des protagonistes.
Deep Wersturn (1974) semble être à la fois un clin d’œil à Off-Handed Jape , pour le côté accumulation d’actions similaires, mais aussi à Plastic Haircut par rapport à une stratégie de réductions des plans au moment du montage. Il s’agit à nouveau d’une collaboration avec William Wiley.
« Il y avait un collectionneur d’art de la région de San Francisco qui s’appelait Sam West. Il s’intéressait à de jeunes artistes inconnus achetait leurs peintures et sculptures ; il acheta ainsi des peintures de Wiley, Allan et Hendeson, des peintures de Geis et Hudson avant quiconque ne les connaisse ? Ils ont eut de belles carrières depuis, mais le truc de West c’était toujours d’être le premier. Il avait une maison pleine de bonnes pièces qu’il avait acquis pour rien, et il était amis de tous ces artistes. C’était un dentiste qui travaillait énormément, un personnage haut en couleurs. Il aimait les choses étranges, et aimait l’art de la côte Ouest. Parfois il faisait du troc : toute la famille de Wiley avait ainsi obtenu des soins dentaires gratuits pendant je ne sais pour combien d’année.
Et puis un beau jour, soudainement, il se suicida. Cela était dû à une suite de problèmes personnels et de santé. Une fête fut organisée en son honneur, dans l’atelier de Bob. Tout le monde a passé un bon moment, en son honneur.
Une autre chose, un mois plutôt, Henderson s’était procuré du contreplaqué qu’il avait scié en forme de pierres tombales. Il nous dit de réaliser nos propres tombeaux. Ce que nous fîmes tous, nous les utilisâmes dans ce film qui met en scène des chutes plus ou moins orchestrées.
 »
Pour Nelson,il est difficile d‘appréhender ce type de film car on ne soit pas à quelles catégories il appartient. Il s’agit de toute évidence d’un film réalisé entre ami, un film artisanal. Trouver quelques choses d’intéressant dans ces films à quatre-sous est un goût acquis. Vous avez besoin d’un public familier.

La question de la visibilité ou de l’invisibilité de ce cinéma de Robert Nelson qui pendant plusieurs années, choisit de ne pas les montrer ou les distribuer est intéressante à plus d’un égard, c’est vers la fin des années 90 qu’il prend cette décision.
Reconnaissons qu’il s’agit d’une attitude partagée par de nombreux cinéastes, parmi ceux ci on retiendra les expériences de Warhol et Markopoulos ou même Guy Debord pour n’en cîter que quel ques uns.
Mais à la différence de ces artistes, pour lesquels le retrait visé à augmenter la valeur des films, en tout cas leur aura, chez Nelson c’est à la fois la fragilité du support, les couleurs s’estompant qui motive ce choix. En effet comment préserver l’œuvre pour le futur si les éléments qui la constituent commencent à se détériorer au point que les films en deviennent méconnaissables.
De plus, ce retrait, lui permet de réévaluer l’œuvre même. Certains de ses films ne correspondant plus à ses préoccupations actuelles, il les revisitent, en les remontant, les altérant, les modifiant et proposent ainsi de nouvelles versions de ces œuvres comme le fit dans le passé de nombreuses fois Kenneth Anger, qui pour certains titres changeait la bande sonore de ces œuvres alors que pour d’autres il les raccourcit.
Certaines actions sont plus radicales et vont jusqu’à la destruction, le démontage, et la réutilisation de la pellicule afin de les incorporer dans de compositions picturales.

C’ est au début des années 2000 qu’il montrera à nouveaux ses travaux lorsque la Pacific Film Archives et l’Academy Film Archives commenceront à les préserver.


[1] Interview avec Scott MacDonald in A Critical Cinema University of California Press, Berkeley 1988 page 261

[2] idem

[3] Pour de plus amples détails sur les premiers travaux de Steve Reich, voir Minimalism : Origins de Edward Strickland