Anthony McCall at Ocularis

From: Thomas Beard (email suppressed)
Date: Thu Apr 20 2006 - 08:02:20 PDT


Ocularis
at Galapagos Art Space
70 North 6th Street, Brooklyn
http://www.ocularis.net/

Monday, April 24 at 8 PM
Argument
Anthony McCall and Andrew Tyndall, 1978, 84 min

"The twin principles of modernism and marketing: seeing fresh promise in
familiar things."

Anthony McCall and Andrew Tyndall's legendary and provocative essay film
Argument, first screened at the Edinburgh International Film Festival in
1978, has been almost unseen for the last twenty years. LUX has now made a
new High Definition restoration of the film, and its trenchant analysis of
media ideology seems more pertinent than ever.

Three male voices dissect one edition of the New York Times through a series
of locked-off shots, revealing the prejudice and latent content of news and
advertisements, reading images as texts and presenting text as an image.
Fashion photographs are used as a starting point for a political
investigation of news, advertising, and images of masculinity - while at the
same time, the filmmakers reflect on their own position and the possibility
of radical film practice. Influenced by both the America and European
avant-gardes, notably Godard and Hollis Frampton, Argument is stylistically
beautiful and relentless in its enquiry.

With an introduction by Anthony McCall.

THE ARGUMENT BOOK

³Typesetting is political: this has rarely been registered as acutely as in
Anthony McCall and Andrew Tyndallıs Argument project. The decision here to
reproduce the Argument book as a complete facsimile of the 1979 edition is
partly a recognition that fonts are as historical as fashions (another of
Argumentıs preoccupations). Fashion and film, as McCall and Tyndall suggest,
both make images to be read ­ both are hieroglyphic. But written language is
itself also an image. This makes the ethos, and pathos, of Argumentıs fonts
one of many underexplored connections between McCall and Tyndallıs project
and the conceptual art of contemporaneous New York.² ­ from the introduction
to the new edition by Mike Sperlinger and Ian White

Alongside the restored version of the film, LUX is pleased to be
republishing the book by Anthony McCall and Andrew Tyndall which was
originally published alongside it, copies of which will be available for
purchase at Ocularis.

As well as being a sustained investigation into the semiotics of newspapers
and magazines, the Argument project turned the spotlight on the issues
around making and screening "political" films. These ideas, which are
present in the film, are developed further in the book, which includes three
important essays by McCall and Tyndall: "Sixteen Working Statements,"
"Artist as Businessman" and "Against the Numbers Theory." The book also
features images from the film, as well as responses and reviews of the
original screenings by Jane Weinstock, David Himelfarb and Claire
Pajaczkowska.

Ticket Price - $6

For more information, please contact Thomas Beard (email suppressed).

About Ocularis

Ocularis is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization that provides a forum for
the exhibition of independent, experimental and documentary film/video and
new media, as well as international and repertory cinema. Established in
1996 as a rooftop film series catering to local audiences in North Brooklyn,
it has since evolved into a weekly cinema, a producer of collaborative
film/video work and a summer open-air screening series.

-- 
Thomas Beard 
Program Director 
Ocularis 
at Galapagos Art Space
70 North 6th Street
Brooklyn, NY 11211
http://www.ocularis.net
__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.