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Process CinemaHandmade Film in the Digital Age |
eBook Available
Exploring new and experimental practices with celluloid film in the digital age.
Handmade films stretch back to cinema's beginnings, yet until now their rich history has been neglected. Process Cinema is the first book to trace the development of handmade and hand-processed film in its historical and contemporary contexts, and from a global perspective.
Mapping the genealogy of handmade film, and uncovering confluences, influences, and interstices between various international movements, sites, and practices, Process Cinema positions the resurgence of handmade and process cinema as a counter-practice to the rise of digital filmmaking. This volume brings together a range of renowned academics and artists to examine contemporary artisanal films, DIY labs, and filmmakers typically left out of the avant-garde canon, addressing the convergence between the analog and the digital in contemporary process cinema. Contributors investigate the history of process cinema - unscripted, improvisatory manipulation of the physicality of film - with chapters on pioneering filmmakers such as Len Lye and Marie Menken, while others discuss an international array of collectives devoted to processing films in artist-run labs from South Korea to Finland, Australia to Austria, and Greenland to Morocco, along with historical and contemporary practices in Canada and the United States.
Addressing the turn to a new, sustainable creative ecology that is central to handmade films in the twenty-first century, and that defines today's reinvigorated film cultures, Process Cinema features some of the most beautiful handcrafted films and the most forward-thinking filmmakers within a global context.
Mapping the genealogy of handmade film, and uncovering confluences, influences, and interstices between various international movements, sites, and practices, Process Cinema positions the resurgence of handmade and process cinema as a counter-practice to the rise of digital filmmaking. This volume brings together a range of renowned academics and artists to examine contemporary artisanal films, DIY labs, and filmmakers typically left out of the avant-garde canon, addressing the convergence between the analog and the digital in contemporary process cinema. Contributors investigate the history of process cinema - unscripted, improvisatory manipulation of the physicality of film - with chapters on pioneering filmmakers such as Len Lye and Marie Menken, while others discuss an international array of collectives devoted to processing films in artist-run labs from South Korea to Finland, Australia to Austria, and Greenland to Morocco, along with historical and contemporary practices in Canada and the United States.
Addressing the turn to a new, sustainable creative ecology that is central to handmade films in the twenty-first century, and that defines today's reinvigorated film cultures, Process Cinema features some of the most beautiful handcrafted films and the most forward-thinking filmmakers within a global context.
Details
536 Pages, 7.5 x 9.5
112 images, colour section
ISBN 9780773556874
July 2019
Formats: Cloth, Paperback, eBook
“The combination of different forms of writing makes this collection unique and dynamic, providing readers with a diverse range of perspectives on handmade film. Spanning historical, theoretical, and creative registers, Process Cinema contributes substantially to conversations on experimental film and to cinema studies generally.” Josh Guilford, Amherst College
“Process Cinema is rich with provocative essays on critically overlooked artists.” LA Review of Books
“Process Cinema is rich with provocative essays on critically overlooked artists.” LA Review of Books
Scott MacKenzie is associate professor of film and media at Queen's University.
Janine Marchessault is professor of cinema and media at York University.
Janine Marchessault is professor of cinema and media at York University.
Acknowledgments / ix
Introduction: Process Cinema: Handmade Film in the Digital Age / 3
Scott MacKenzie and Janine Marchessault
Part One Histories of Handmade Film
1 Twenty-Four Signatures per Second: Direct Animation and Gestural Repetition / 21
Alla Gadassik
2 At the Limits of Cinema: Marie Menken’s Notebook / 40
Angela Joosse
3 Artisanal Filmmaking in Australia / 57
Arthur Cantrill
Part Two Process as Practice
4 Self-Skilling and Home-Brewing: Some Reflections on Photochemical Film Culture / 75
Kim Knowles
5 After: A Beginner’s Guide to Alchemy / 85
Carl Brown
6 How and Why: A Few Notes Concerning Production Techniques Employed in the Making of My Darkroom Films / 90
Peter Tscherkassky
7 Peter Tscherkassky Manufractures Two Minutes of (Im)Pure Cinema / 96
Tom Gunning
8 Echoes of the Earth: Handmade Film Ecologies / 108
Gregory Zinman
9 Signs of the Three: Process and Composition in Works by Bruce Elder, Izabella Pruska-Oldenhof, and Blake Williams / 125
Bart Testa
10 Notes on the Materiality of Language in the Synthetic Sound Film / 151
Kelly Egan
Part Three Labs and Collectives
11 The Artist-Run Film Labs / 165
Pip Chodorov
12 Toward Artisanal Cinema: A Filmmakers’ Movement / 171
Chris Gehman
13 Impalpable Boundary, Invisible Common: From Ciné-Clubs to Artist-Run Film Labs in Korea / 194
Junho Oh
14 A Collective Charge: Collectif double négativ/ Double Negative Collective / 214
Mike Rollo
15 A Short Overview of the Production and Distribution of Alternative Filmmaking in France / 231
Frédérique Devaux
16 Letter to Frédérique Devaux concerning Isou’s Traité de bave et d’éternité / 244
Stan Brakhage
17 Experimental? It’s Not My “Type”! / 247
Frédérique Devaux
18 A Dangerous Encounter: Lab Laba-Laba and the New Order’s Archive of Authoritarianism / 250
Veronika Kusumaryati
Part Four Pedagogies
19 The Materiality of Abstract Animation: The Discovery and Analysis of an Unreleased Film by Gordon Webber / 271
Marco de Blois and Guillaume Lafleur
20 “Sight Unseen”: The Ethos of Handmade Films / 279
Hart Cohen
21 Your Film Farm Manifesto of Process Cinema / 292
Philip Hoffman
22 Chemistry Class: Jeffrey Paull, the Escarpment School, and the Legacy of Process Cinema at Sheridan College / 294
Brett Kashmere
23 The Sound We See: Growing a Global Slow Film Movement / 319
Lisa Marr and Paolo Davanzo
24 A Travelogue in Two Parts: Hand-Processing in the Sahara and Finding no.w.here / 336
Terra Long
Part Five Counter Cinemas
25 Some Recipes for Disaster in the Films of Deirdre Logue and Helen Hill / 353
Janine Marchessault
26 The Immediate Sensuous: The Process Cinema of Jennifer Reeves / 369
Brenda Longfellow
27 Tearing Up the Screen: Pia Arke’s Post-Colonial Processes / 390
Scott MacKenzie and Anna Westerstahl Stenport
28 Projection as Performance: Recent Directions in Canadian Expanded Cinema / 407
Dan Browne
Part Six Digital Interfaces
29 Practice, Interface, and Outcome: Two Interviews in Helsinki / 429
Sami van Ingen
30 Dismantling the Cinema: Restraining Presentness with Locative Media and Experimental Architecture / 440
Solomon Nagler
31 Writing the World: Medium Specificity and Avant-Garde Film in the Digital Age / 459
Tess Takahashi
32 Hardware Hacking, Software Modding, and File Manipulation: Process Cinema in the Digital Age / 483
Clint Enns
Illustrations / 499
Contributors / 505
Index / 513
Introduction: Process Cinema: Handmade Film in the Digital Age / 3
Scott MacKenzie and Janine Marchessault
Part One Histories of Handmade Film
1 Twenty-Four Signatures per Second: Direct Animation and Gestural Repetition / 21
Alla Gadassik
2 At the Limits of Cinema: Marie Menken’s Notebook / 40
Angela Joosse
3 Artisanal Filmmaking in Australia / 57
Arthur Cantrill
Part Two Process as Practice
4 Self-Skilling and Home-Brewing: Some Reflections on Photochemical Film Culture / 75
Kim Knowles
5 After: A Beginner’s Guide to Alchemy / 85
Carl Brown
6 How and Why: A Few Notes Concerning Production Techniques Employed in the Making of My Darkroom Films / 90
Peter Tscherkassky
7 Peter Tscherkassky Manufractures Two Minutes of (Im)Pure Cinema / 96
Tom Gunning
8 Echoes of the Earth: Handmade Film Ecologies / 108
Gregory Zinman
9 Signs of the Three: Process and Composition in Works by Bruce Elder, Izabella Pruska-Oldenhof, and Blake Williams / 125
Bart Testa
10 Notes on the Materiality of Language in the Synthetic Sound Film / 151
Kelly Egan
Part Three Labs and Collectives
11 The Artist-Run Film Labs / 165
Pip Chodorov
12 Toward Artisanal Cinema: A Filmmakers’ Movement / 171
Chris Gehman
13 Impalpable Boundary, Invisible Common: From Ciné-Clubs to Artist-Run Film Labs in Korea / 194
Junho Oh
14 A Collective Charge: Collectif double négativ/ Double Negative Collective / 214
Mike Rollo
15 A Short Overview of the Production and Distribution of Alternative Filmmaking in France / 231
Frédérique Devaux
16 Letter to Frédérique Devaux concerning Isou’s Traité de bave et d’éternité / 244
Stan Brakhage
17 Experimental? It’s Not My “Type”! / 247
Frédérique Devaux
18 A Dangerous Encounter: Lab Laba-Laba and the New Order’s Archive of Authoritarianism / 250
Veronika Kusumaryati
Part Four Pedagogies
19 The Materiality of Abstract Animation: The Discovery and Analysis of an Unreleased Film by Gordon Webber / 271
Marco de Blois and Guillaume Lafleur
20 “Sight Unseen”: The Ethos of Handmade Films / 279
Hart Cohen
21 Your Film Farm Manifesto of Process Cinema / 292
Philip Hoffman
22 Chemistry Class: Jeffrey Paull, the Escarpment School, and the Legacy of Process Cinema at Sheridan College / 294
Brett Kashmere
23 The Sound We See: Growing a Global Slow Film Movement / 319
Lisa Marr and Paolo Davanzo
24 A Travelogue in Two Parts: Hand-Processing in the Sahara and Finding no.w.here / 336
Terra Long
Part Five Counter Cinemas
25 Some Recipes for Disaster in the Films of Deirdre Logue and Helen Hill / 353
Janine Marchessault
26 The Immediate Sensuous: The Process Cinema of Jennifer Reeves / 369
Brenda Longfellow
27 Tearing Up the Screen: Pia Arke’s Post-Colonial Processes / 390
Scott MacKenzie and Anna Westerstahl Stenport
28 Projection as Performance: Recent Directions in Canadian Expanded Cinema / 407
Dan Browne
Part Six Digital Interfaces
29 Practice, Interface, and Outcome: Two Interviews in Helsinki / 429
Sami van Ingen
30 Dismantling the Cinema: Restraining Presentness with Locative Media and Experimental Architecture / 440
Solomon Nagler
31 Writing the World: Medium Specificity and Avant-Garde Film in the Digital Age / 459
Tess Takahashi
32 Hardware Hacking, Software Modding, and File Manipulation: Process Cinema in the Digital Age / 483
Clint Enns
Illustrations / 499
Contributors / 505
Index / 513
