From: Gregory Kurcewicz (email suppressed)
Date: Wed Sep 07 2005 - 12:43:13 PDT
Just a note on English film and video - of course there are bad things and good things which need to be considered on an individual basis -
There is what I would call a strong "Humanist" strand of filmmakers in this country that came out of the 60's. Even when they are "Structural" they are "humanist" as well - I'm thinking of people like Guy Sherwin, William Raban and Nicky Hamlyn (apologies Nicky if you object to this tag - I know youre on this list - I see it as a very positive tag) Then you have the "Research school" who were very analytical and dry - I wont mention names - as I leaned my lesson a while ago. A research strand who follow the money in research grants for new technology - the latest of that front being "machinima" (yeuch) Then there's the theoretical bunch who do a History of Art Masters and try to make work applying that half understood discipline to filmmaking / video making. This latter bunch I kind of despair of - it's rife over here..Unfortunantely they usually get the grants.eg : ("Its a triple screen webpodcast involving Bachelard's analysis of poetics of space from my trip to Japan paid for by the British Council - I'm also translating it into Greek")
The YBA's who made film and video were in part quite interesting - but a lot has been very derivative. As my learned friend Karen Mirza says - "High Gloss Art-lite"
The worst aspect of artists' film and video exhibition is like others mentioned earlier - the installation of film and video work in galleries.
There's a particular gallery in a city near me - i won't mention names - that is really depressing , it's almost as if they really don't care about the viewer - as long as they have filled the space (cheap content) and designed the catalogue , it's as if they think that's enough.
Perhaps I wouldn't mind as much if they just put some cheap chairs in there to sit in.
But no , they don't have a concept of actually looking at things.
In Hope
Greg Kurcewicz
----- Original Message -----
From: db
To: email suppressed
Sent: Wednesday, September 07, 2005 6:55 PM
Subject: Re: The Politics of Avant-Garde Language (was Re: video art, etc)
On Sep 7, 2005, at 9:28 AM, Puget Sound Cinema Society wrote:
A cantankerous but quite enjoyable post, Omar. This statement particularly stood out for me:
I believe that opening up the world of exploratory film and video as the domain solely of po-mo intellectuals and professors trained to deal in hot air even as they laugh at it, is a BAD IDEA. I also think that not all students of avant-garde film need be college students versed in Lyotard, Habermas, Gadamer, Barthes, Metz and blah blah blah. But there seems to be this notion circulating amongst writers and speakers on avant-garde film that there are simply two types of people: the novice and the initiate.
Beyond the obvious church/state/masonic issues of the novice/initiate, the point you are making reminded me of an edit session I had once. The producer I was working with kept saying over and over, "this is where we separate the fly shit from the pepper." I finally said to him, "I'll leave that to you."
db
who would rather get into self-mutilation than ever read anything by Metz again. Or is that a redundant statement?
Also, did Metz ever write about any "avant garde" films? My memory is of an author completely enclosed within a Hitchcock/Hollywood narrative fetish.
__________________________________________________________________ For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
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__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.