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The exhibition
Arthur Lipsett: About Time presents the first European retrospective
of Lipsett’s concise but influential career, re-assembling his dazzling
collage work alongside correlative Canadian media artists from the past
half-century. Always rhythmically “in time,” Lipsett’s
filmmaking opened new directions and possibilities for his and subsequent
generations. Seen in this context, Lipsett’s experiments, with time,
assume ever richer, more abundant meanings.
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Special thanks to
Patrick Javault and Catherine Hubert, Musée d'art moderne et contemporain
de Strasbourg; James Roberts, National Film Board of Canada; Lauren Howes
and Jeff Crawford, Canadian Filmmakers Distribution Center; Wanda Vanderstoop
and Erik Martinson, Vtape; Christophe Bichon, Light Cone; Valérie
Perrin, Espace multimédia Gantner; Martine Markovits, École
nationale supérieure des beaux-arts; Stéphanie Côté,
Cinémathèque québécoise; Lois Siegel, Eric Gaucher,
Astria Suparak, and Marian Arnold for their generous assistance.
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Arthur Lipsett:
About Time is produced by the Musée d'art moderne et contemporain
de Strasbourg. Travel funding provided by The Canada Council for the Arts.
The films of Arthur Lipsett are produced and distributed by the National
Film Board of Canada, except for Strange Codes, which was preserved
and provided by La Cinémathèque québécoise.
Additional films and videos are courtesy Canadian Filmmakers Distribution
Centre and Vtape. |
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VERY NICE,
VERY NICE (1961, 16mm, b&w, 7 min)
Arthur Lipsett's first film received
a 1962 Academy Award nomination in the Best Live Action Short category.
Like all of his films, Very Nice, Very Nice disrupts the representational
value of documentary image and sound, moving beyond the genre's aesthetic
codes of truth and reliability. The result is a sardonic re-reading of 1950s
consumerism, mass media and popular culture. Images of the repulsive and
often overlooked damage left by both war and technological progress punctuate
Very Nice, Very Nice, giving the film an enduring punch. |
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A TRIP DOWN MEMORY LANE (1965,
16mm, b&w, 12 min)
A surrealist time capsule combining
fifty years of newsreel footage, A Trip Down Memory Lane was Lipsett's
first pure collage film, composed exclusively from stock image and sound
from the NFB bins. Continuing his process of excavation, mediation and transformation,
the film constitutes a brief audiovisual tour of the post-war technocracy.
“Another incisive look at human might, majesty, and mayhem,”
reads the NFB catalogue description. “The filmmaker calls this a time
capsule, but his arrangement of pictures makes it almost explosive. There
are hundreds of items, once front-page stuff, but all wryly grotesque when
seen in this reshuffle of the past.” |
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21-87 (1964, 16mm, b&w,
10 min)
Described as “A wry commentary
on machine-dominated man” and as “fragments of a prophesy,”
21–87 is filled with dystopian symbolism. The film conveys
Lipsett's concern for an increasingly de-humanized civilization, foreshadowing
his embryonic agoraphobia and subsequent withdrawal from public life. 21–87
concludes with “a good-hearted friendly voice” repeating
a line from earlier in the film, which encapsulates Lipsett’s view
of social conformity: “Somebody walks up and you say, ‘Your
number is 21-87, isn't it?’ Boy does that person really smile.”
One of his most successful pieces, 21-87 received Second Prize at the 1964
Palo Alto Film-Makers Festival in California, where Kenneth Anger's Scorpio
Rising (1962) and Bruce Conner's Cosmic Ray (1963) finished
first and third respectively; the title, 21-87 later served as
Princess Leia’s cell number in Star Wars (1977). |
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FREE FALL (1964, 16mm, b&w,
9 min)
Free Fall features dazzling
pixilation, in-camera superimpositions, percussive tribal music, syncopated
rhythms and ironic juxtapositions. Using a brisk “single-framing”
technique, Lipsett attempts to create a synesthesic experience through the
intensification of image and sound. Citing the film theorist Sigfreud Kracauer,
Lipsett writes, “Throughout this psychophysical reality, inner and
outer events intermingle and fuse with each other – 'I cannot tell
whether I am seeing or hearing – I feel taste, and smell sound –
it's all one – I myself am the tone.'” Incidentally, Free
Fall was intended as a collaboration with the American composer John
Cage, modeled on his system of chance operations. However, Cage subsequently
withdrew his participation fearing Lipsett would attempt to control and
thereby undermine the aleatory organization of audio and visuals. |
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FLUXES (1968, 16mm, b&w,
24 min)
Completed during a period of
declining institutional support and increased psychological stress, Fluxes
is notably longer and more diffuse than Lipsett’s previous films.
Writing on Fluxes, Andrew Munger observes that “the military
motif, religious rhetoric and newsreel footage of the trial of 'final solution'
architect Adolf Eichmann, accompanied by dialogue from a trashy 1950s science
fiction film, collides history and popular culture into… 'a phantasmagoria
of nothing.'” The film is Lipsett's most scathing, pessimistic work,
and represents a metaphorical emptying out of the NFB trim bin. |
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Total running time:
65 minutes, prints courtesy National Film Board of Canada |
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ROSE (Rick Hancox,
1968, 16mm, color, 3 min)
“An experiment in film collage made without the use
of a camera. It utilizes food dye and handscratched animation directly on
the film surface, intercut with live action found footage starring Hayley
Mills. Hacked-up footage from an amateur monster movie is parallel-cut throughout,
creating the appearance of a narrative.” - CFMDC catalogue |
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HANDTINTING (Joyce Wieland,
1967, 16mm, color, silent, 6 min)
“Handtinting is
the apt title of a film made from outtakes from a Job Corps documentary
which features hand-tinted sections. The film is full of small movements
and actions, gestures begun and never completed. Repeated images, sometimes
in colour, sometimes not. A beautifully realized type of chamber-music film
whose sum-total feeling is ritualistic.” - Robert Cowan, Take
One
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HYSTERIA (Christina Battle,
2006, 35mm, b&w, 3.5 min)
“In hysteria,
Christina Battle refers obliquely to the contemporary political climate
using schoolbook illustrations of the Salem witch trials. She works the
surface of the film in distinctive ways, lifting the emulsion to add new
wrinkles to the image one frame at a time.” - Chris Gehman and Andréa
Picard, Toronto International Film Festival |
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THE BABBLE ON PALMS (Steven
Woloshen, 2001, 35mm, color/b&w, 4 min)
“The Babble on Palms
is a lush and vibrant cameraless animation, combining found footage, scratch
and inking techniques with the universal language of music. Individuality,
censorship, shared experiences, and unseen auras are just some of the topics
examined in this short experimental animation. Perhaps, when our ears cease
to listen, the "babble on" palms, speak. Made on September 12th,
2001 in response to the previous day’s event.” - CFMDC catalogue
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C: WON EYED JAIL (Kelly Egan,
2005, 35mm, color, 5 min)
“C: won eyed jail
is a 35mm film project consisting of two parts: a quilt patterned out of
35mm still negatives and 35mm found motion picture, and a traditional film
print of the quilt that is screened through a 35mm motion picture projector.
I consider this quilt/film homage to Joyce Wieland, whose artwork called
into question the binary oppositions concerning issues of art and craft,
personal and public space, content and form, narrative and experimental,
as well as commenting on the sociopolitical environment in which we live.”
- CFMDC catalogue
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GIRL FROM MOUSH (Gariné
Torossian, 1993, 16mm, color, 6 min)
“Girl from Moush
is a poetic montage of the artist’s journey through her subconscious
Armenia. It is not an Armenia based in a reality, but one which appears,
like the mythical city of Shangra La, when one closes one’s eyes.
Rooted in what Jung may call a ‘communal consciousness,’ her
Armenia appears on film as a collage of myth, legend, experience and immigration.”
- CFMDC catalogue |
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FUGITIVE L(I)GHT (Izabella
Pruska-Oldenhof, 16mm, 2005, color, 8.5 min)
“This film explores the
morph-like quality of the Serpentine Dance and its intricate play on the
visible and the invisible, which extends to the larger context and legacy
of its originator, the American born Loïe Fuller. Fugitive l(i)ght
is composed of elaborately reworked found footage, originally captured by
Thomas Edison and the Lumière brothers, of various renditions and
imitations of Fuller's Serpentine performances, where glimmers of her presence
slip into the film by means of the artist's absence; both Fuller's and my
momentary suspensions through my use of chance operation. These found films
are woven into intricately reworked sequences using several computer programs
and following the poetic interpretations of several artists who experienced
Fuller’s performances in person: texts of Mallarmé, lithographs
of Toulouse-Lautrec, sketches of Whistler, and a futurist manifesto on dance
by Marinetti.” - CFMDC catalogue |
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LE BOMBARDEMENT LE PORT DES
PERLES (Richard Kerr, 35mm transferred to DV, color, 9 min)
“A reworking of the trailer
for the movie Pearl Harbor, using both handmade and digital techniques.
Formally, Le Bombardement explores collage and found sound as voice-over.”
- CFMDC catalogue |
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READY TO COPE (Aleesa Cohene,
2006, mini DV, color, 6.5 min, from Vtape)
“When denial is a national
crisis, the psychological implications of security issues become paramount.
In resistance to Canada's recent Anti-Terrorism Act, Ready to Cope
comments on the ways in which society's chronic obsession for safety and
security has become both a private and public crutch. Edited from clips
from horror and science fiction films, thrillers, self-help guides and motivational
instruction videos, Ready to Cope is an impassioned record of collective
anxiety.” - Vtape catalogue |
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ICON (Alissa Firth-Eagland,
2003, mini DV, color, 1.5 min, from Vtape)
“While I have a great appreciation for the trigger-edit
style that some artists use to produce video, I find it to be used most
commonly with imagery that drips with machismo - porn, explosions, horror
flicks - to create a highly offensive fast-paced barrage of media. This
video is [an] experiment, to see if I could create a work using classic
Hollywood shots of women in the same way to deconstruct the iconic stature
of the starlet in western cinema.” - Vtape catalogue |
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I STOLE THE SOUL OF ROCK N
ROLL (Tasman Richardson, 2005, mini DV, color, 6 min, from Vtape)
“Through the miracle of video, space and time are collapsed
to merge the performances of ice cube, zeppelin, public enemy, the who,
and many more, while Charlton Heston chimes in with a little gansta rap.
Folded and manipulated into perfect synchronicity in true mega mash post-everything
style.” - Vtape catalogue |
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Total running
time: 65 minutes, from Canadian Filmmakers Distribution Centre,
unless indicated otherwise |
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N-ZONE (1970, 16mm,
b&w, 43 min)
N-Zone is Lipsett's
most personal film and a departure from his associative montage style. The
film balances a measured use of found footage with scenes of Lipsett and
his friends alone and in casual conversation. These “characters”
enact an unspoken confrontation between unbridled individuality and social
conformity. His usual mixed-bag of pompous politicians, circus stunts, advertising
slogans, and atomic bombs is replaced by a thinned-out audiovisual inventory
of bells, chanting, celestial imagery, tea ceremonies, candles, crucifixes,
statues and other religious symbols. Whereas Very Nice, Very Nice
shaped the dull remains of documentary outtakes into a razor-sharp satire
of Cold War suspicion, repression and nuclear escalation, N-Zone
documents a private quest for spiritual transcendence. |
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STRANGE CODES (1972, 16mm,
b&w, 23 min)
In Strange Codes the
artist’s apartment becomes the stage for a disjunctive, live-action
self-portrait. Operating at the edge of impenetrability, Lipsett’s
last completed project is both a riddle and, in the words of Christopher
Nutter, “an index to his other films.” Like N-Zone,
Strange Codes was made with the assistance of Lipsett’s friend
and collaborator Henry Zemel. It features an active camera; recycled science-film
audio from Lipsett’s earlier Trip Down Memory Lane (1965),
which is inter-cut with Eastern music; and numerous costume changes, masks,
and constructed props and sets. The result is a looping concoction of serious
play and light mysticism. Produced with the financial aid of the Canada
Council for the Arts. |
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Total running time:
70 minutes, prints courtesy National Film Board of Canada and La Cinémathèque
québécoise. |
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ARTIST
BIOGRAPHIES
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Arthur
Lipsett
(1936-1986) was one of Canadian cinema’s most original artists and
a key figure in the development of experimental cinema. Lipsett’s
charismatic presence and tough avant-garde films lit up Canadian and international
festivals in the 1960s. His perfectly judged film cuts, masterful control
of sound collage and acerbic wit brought him worldwide interest when his
first NFB film, Very Nice, Very Nice (1961), was nominated for
an Academy Award for Best Live Action Short. His later films are increasingly
metaphysical and filled with elusive, even opaque cinematic poetry, and
demonstrate a transcendental quality rare in Canadian cinema. |
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Rick
Hancox teaches film in the Communications Department of
Concordia University in Montréal, and studied film and photography
at NYU and Ohio University, where he earned his MFA. He is known as an artistic
innovator of experimental and personal documentary films, including Moose
Jaw (There’s a Future in Our Past), LANDFALL, and Waterworx
(A Clear Day and No Memories), which are in the collection of the National
Gallery of Canada. He taught for twelve years at Sheridan College near Toronto,
where he influenced some of Canada’s foremost experimental filmmakers,
including Mike Hoolboom, Richard Kerr, and Philip Hoffman.
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Joyce
Wieland (1931-1998) is regarded as Canada’s foremost
female artist. She produced an acclaimed body of work in a great variety
of media, from painting and drawing to quilts and film. She gained a unique
respect for incorporating strong personal statements in her work about issues
of feminism, nationalism and ecology long before it had become fashionable
to do so. Her retrospective at the Art Gallery of Ontario was the first-ever
afforded a living Canadian woman artist.
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Christina
Battle holds a B.Sc. in
Environmental Biology from the University of Alberta and an MFA from the
San Francisco Art Institute. She lives in Toronto, where she is an active
member of its experimental film community. Her work has been screened internationally
in galleries and festivals including VideoEx Experimental Film & Video
Festival, Antimatter Underground Film Festival, the London Film Festival,
The Images Festival, White Box, and the 2006 Whitney Biennial. |
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Steven
Woloshen was born in Montréal in 1960. His first
exposure to film was in 1972. A local community program encouraged young
people to make films without the aid of camera or raw stock of any kind.
In 1980 he was admitted to Concordia University in Montréal and specialized
in 16mm independent film techniques. Woloshen currently lives in Québec
and has been a member of the Directors’ Guild of Canada since 1991.
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Kelly
Egan holds a BA (Honours) from Carleton University, a MA
from York/Ryerson University, and a MFA in Film/Video from Bard College.
Her films have been screened at major festivals across North America, including
the Toronto International Film Festival and New York Film Festival. She
is currently working towards a PhD degree at York/Ryerson University in
Toronto. In her spare time she enjoys standing at the intersection of visual
and musical culture, and listening to the lights change colour.
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Gariné
Torossian was born in Beirut, Lebanon of Armenian origin.
She moved to Canada in 1979. She is primarily a self-taught filmmaker and
photographer. Torossian’s award-winning films have traveled around
the world, and retrospectives of her work have taken place in New York at
the Museum of Modern Art, Armenia's Cinematheque, Berlin Arsenal and the
Telluride Film Festival. |
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Izabella
Pruska-Oldenhof was born in Poland. At the age of twelve
she immigrated with her parents to Toronto, where she currently resides.
Pruska-Oldenhof is a graduate of Ryerson University (Bachelor of Applied
Arts), and York University (Master of Arts). Her films and videos have been
recognized and awarded for their artistic merit by various film festivals
and arts organizations. Pruska-Oldenhof is also a founding member of the
interdisciplinary Loop Collective. She is currently working towards her
PhD degree at York University. |
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Richard
Kerr is an artist-filmmaker known for his wide-ranging body
of work, which has explored a multiplicity of subjects in various genres
since the early seventies. Kerr expanded his practice in the mid-nineties
to encompass installation work and object making. He is currently a Professor
of Film Production in the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema at Concordia University
in Montréal. |
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Aleesa
Cohene is an experimental video artist and picture editor
based in Toronto. Her work reedits found media to build an emotional language
through which to explore contemporary political problems. Her videos have
shown in festival and gallery settings internationally including screenings
at the Rotterdam International Film Festival, the Oberhausen Short Film
Festival, MIX Brasil, Impakt, and The Images Festival. Cohene is In-House
Editor at Charles Street Video, a media arts centre in Toronto, and teaches
courses and workshops on video editing theory in diverse local educational
settings. |
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Artist-curator Alissa
Firth-Eagland graduated from the Ontario College of Art
and Design in 2003 where her studies focused on curatorial practice, critical
writing, performance art, and conceptual video art production. Committed
to critical analysis and discussion, she focuses on the exhibition and creation
of experimental art practices such as performance, multimedia, installation,
and film and video works. Firth-Eagland is currently the Director/Curator
of Media Art at Western Front in Vancouver.
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Tasman
Richardson is a videomaker, electronic composer, and graphic
designer based in Toronto. To date he has had screenings and installations
both nationally and internationally in Austria, Switzerland, Holland, Argentina,
Egypt, Poland, England, the United States and Canada. He is also the founder
of the Jawa collective (champions of aggressive machine gun sex and death
video style), media label / curatorial collective FAMEFAME, and co-founder
of the Canadian Video Alliance. |
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ABOUT
THE CURATOR
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Brett Kashmere grew
up playing hockey on the Canadian prairies. A filmmaker and educator, he
writes extensively about avant-garde cinema, documentary, music and video,
curates international exhibitions, and teaches experimental film. In 2008,
he will be a Visiting Assistant Professor at Oberlin College in Ohio.
Kashmere is a founding member of the antechamber art gallery & cinematheque,
a non-profit organization dedicated to the support of emerging independent
artists and filmmakers, and Syracuse Experimental, a film and media workshop.
He has presented screenings and curated exhibitions at festivals and venues
such as the Seoul Film Festival, the D.U.M.B.O. Arts Festival in Brooklyn,
Cinematheque Ontario, New York's Eyebeam Center for Art and Technology,
Portland's Cinema Project, Images Festival in Toronto, and La Cinematheque
québecoise. In 2004 he organized the touring expanded cinema installation
and DVD-format catalog, Industrie: Oeuvres récentes de Richard
Kerr.
Kashmere’s films and videos have screened internationally at the London
Film Festival, Made in Video: International Video Art Festival in Copenhagen,
Anthology Film Archives in New York, and the Kassel Documentary Festival
in Germany. His work combines traditional research methods with hybrid interfaces,
handmade equipment, and materialist aesthetics. Through intricate experimental
documentaries and unadorned camera movies, he explores the intersection
of history and (counter-) memory, geographies of identity, and the politics
of representation. His most recently completed film-essay, Valery’s
Ankle, explores the spectacle of hockey violence in North American
media. The film scholar Thomas Waugh writes that Valery’s Ankle
“may well give momentum (and integrity) to the discourses of sports,
masculinity, and nationalism in Canadian cinemas.”
Kashmere’s writing has appeared in journals and magazines such as
The Canadian Journal of Film Studies, ESSE arts et opinions, Take One,
PROTEÉ revue internationale de theories et de pratiques semiotiques,
Senses of Cinema, Synoptique, and Offscreen, and anthologies
like The Films of Jack Chambers, The Encyclopedia of the Documentary
Film, and the forthcoming volume, Excesses and Extremes in Film
and Video. Kashmere holds an MA in Film Studies and an MFA in Studio
Arts from Concordia University in Montréal.
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