Thursday, September 11, 2003
i yearned today. for a person. god, that felt weird.
Werner Hamacher: The Right to Have Rights (lecture)
This looks like it's going to be good, I'll be there, 9/16, 7pm Deutsches Haus at NYU:
Werner Hamacher: The Right to Have Rights
Professor Werner Hamacher will discuss the political theology of "human rights" as it is propounded by Marx, and juxtapose it with his reconstruction of Hannah Arendt's critical view of "human rights." He will refer primarily to Marx's text on "The Jewish Question" and Arendt's work on The Origins of Totalitarianism
Werner Hamacher: The Right to Have Rights
Professor Werner Hamacher will discuss the political theology of "human rights" as it is propounded by Marx, and juxtapose it with his reconstruction of Hannah Arendt's critical view of "human rights." He will refer primarily to Marx's text on "The Jewish Question" and Arendt's work on The Origins of Totalitarianism
Last night I urinated in a fountain in front of the Hyatt by Grand Central.
Monday, September 08, 2003
I'm realizing that so many of my educational goals seem to lead up to an attempt at understanding Cardew's "Treatise." What did Wittgenstein mean to Cardew?
The Straits of Magellan - Hollis Frampton
This is a first for me, blogging on the clock. I rule!
On Saturday, went with Randy and Heather to see the 2nd program in Anthology's screenings of Hollis Frampton's unfinished monstrosity of a project, "The Magellen Project." I believe it was intended to be 36 or so hours, he completed 8 of them before dying of lung cancer.
It's an odd bit of work, in some ways they seem immediately accessible, in others, hopelessly opaque. His written work can be abstruse beyond belief, Circles of Confustion, a collection compiled by Annette Michaelson is unbelieveably convoluted, I tried to read some of it on the subway and was stymied in minutes.
The films have an elegance that his prose lacks, he earned his bread through commercial photography, so his compositions are always precise and compelling, especially when he's working in color. He's usually identified as a "structuralist", and while the other things I've seen by him are really conceptually rich, there's always a way into the films, whether through strictly formal beauty, or sometimes humor.
1. Public Domain - A collection of found footage pieces, printed off of paper negatives from the library of congress, arranged alphabetically by content (beach, bubbles, bullfighting, hanging etc.) It's a kind of inversion of "Zorns Lemma"; in that film the words are immediately visible, and it is the images that replace them that seem to help to decompose the order; while in this film, while you're looking at the image, you're trying to figure out what word encapsulates it, so as to determine it's place in the structure of the film. Heather said that a lot of the images are from the Edison films, it's a connection that's worth chasing down.
2. Straits of Magellan: Drafts and Fragments [Panopticons] (excerpts)A large collection from which excerpts were show, out of 49 one minute films, we saw about 20 or so. I was kinda drifting in and out during the middle of this one, I recall an intensely disturbing imaged of a little man standing in the flame on a gas stove, but I think that was just my imagination fucking with me. Whatever they were, they were pleasant enough, one doesn't really think of the Didacticist Frampton when thinking about "everyday moments of beauty", but that's what a lot of these were, tightly shot bits of abstractions, mostly outside. Lots of prettiness, shapes, you get the feeling that he's studied Malevich or Rodchenko, lots of hard angles and simple shapes. One shot stays with me, it was of a cow being slaughtered outside on a slab of concrete. Where the blood was pouring out of the head cavity, you could see a reflection of the clouds in the pool that was forming on the ground. While we were having a drink later on, Randy remarked about how impressed he was that none of the films were really very literary in character.
Shit, I've gotta go back upstairs and actually work. Will finish later.
----
Ok, I'm off the clock now, have Mississippi John Hurt running through my head, so I'll try to finish this.
3. Ingeimm Vibis Ipsa Pvella Fecit [Vernal Equinox]This was a fairly simple nude figure motion study, modeled after Eadward Muybridge's. It could very well have been a functional thing, you could see the muscles of each part of the woman's body slowly being moved, and the gestures repeated, stuttering. Very simple, very nice. (as I go back and think about it more, it's actually very complex, there's lots of funny stuff done in the printing that makes it a lot more than just a figure study, and then trying to figure out why he's alluding to Muybridge [techniques of the observer, light/color/form]
4. Summer Solstice [Solariummagelani (2)] A film about cows. This was my favorite one out of all of them in the program. It was entirely comprised either shots of cows (close-ups, profiles, longer shots where you see more of the landscape, and them aggregated), or shots of the grass. He managed to get a ton of milage out of these two things, rhythmically and compositionally. The pace was fairly brisk, and at 40 minutes he really had a chance to build up a number of patterns and situtions, cutting between different times of the day. Cows seem to me a very suitable subject for cinema. If you can model the pace of your film around the pace of a cow's life, you're set. Randy mentioned that it would have made a great prelude to "Satantango."
5. Straits of Magellan: Drafts and Fragments [Panopticons] (more excerpts) More abstract, gentle everyday situations, a cat playing with (and mauling as well) a little bird, parks, that sort of thing.
6. Pas de Trois- Something about sex and flicker. Didn't make too much of an impression, it was done to better effect in something else I saw, maybe Arthur Lipsett? I dunno, too tired to look it up, it screened at Donell about a year and a half ago as a tribute to the Film Maker's Co-op.
6. Ingeimm Vibis Ipsa Pvella Fecit [Vernal Equinox] More motion studies. Same as above.
That's it, I think. Next week, when Matt comes down, I think we'll see more of the programs, there are four in all.
On Saturday, went with Randy and Heather to see the 2nd program in Anthology's screenings of Hollis Frampton's unfinished monstrosity of a project, "The Magellen Project." I believe it was intended to be 36 or so hours, he completed 8 of them before dying of lung cancer.
It's an odd bit of work, in some ways they seem immediately accessible, in others, hopelessly opaque. His written work can be abstruse beyond belief, Circles of Confustion, a collection compiled by Annette Michaelson is unbelieveably convoluted, I tried to read some of it on the subway and was stymied in minutes.
The films have an elegance that his prose lacks, he earned his bread through commercial photography, so his compositions are always precise and compelling, especially when he's working in color. He's usually identified as a "structuralist", and while the other things I've seen by him are really conceptually rich, there's always a way into the films, whether through strictly formal beauty, or sometimes humor.
1. Public Domain - A collection of found footage pieces, printed off of paper negatives from the library of congress, arranged alphabetically by content (beach, bubbles, bullfighting, hanging etc.) It's a kind of inversion of "Zorns Lemma"; in that film the words are immediately visible, and it is the images that replace them that seem to help to decompose the order; while in this film, while you're looking at the image, you're trying to figure out what word encapsulates it, so as to determine it's place in the structure of the film. Heather said that a lot of the images are from the Edison films, it's a connection that's worth chasing down.
2. Straits of Magellan: Drafts and Fragments [Panopticons] (excerpts)A large collection from which excerpts were show, out of 49 one minute films, we saw about 20 or so. I was kinda drifting in and out during the middle of this one, I recall an intensely disturbing imaged of a little man standing in the flame on a gas stove, but I think that was just my imagination fucking with me. Whatever they were, they were pleasant enough, one doesn't really think of the Didacticist Frampton when thinking about "everyday moments of beauty", but that's what a lot of these were, tightly shot bits of abstractions, mostly outside. Lots of prettiness, shapes, you get the feeling that he's studied Malevich or Rodchenko, lots of hard angles and simple shapes. One shot stays with me, it was of a cow being slaughtered outside on a slab of concrete. Where the blood was pouring out of the head cavity, you could see a reflection of the clouds in the pool that was forming on the ground. While we were having a drink later on, Randy remarked about how impressed he was that none of the films were really very literary in character.
Shit, I've gotta go back upstairs and actually work. Will finish later.
----
Ok, I'm off the clock now, have Mississippi John Hurt running through my head, so I'll try to finish this.
3. Ingeimm Vibis Ipsa Pvella Fecit [Vernal Equinox]This was a fairly simple nude figure motion study, modeled after Eadward Muybridge's. It could very well have been a functional thing, you could see the muscles of each part of the woman's body slowly being moved, and the gestures repeated, stuttering. Very simple, very nice. (as I go back and think about it more, it's actually very complex, there's lots of funny stuff done in the printing that makes it a lot more than just a figure study, and then trying to figure out why he's alluding to Muybridge [techniques of the observer, light/color/form]
4. Summer Solstice [Solariummagelani (2)] A film about cows. This was my favorite one out of all of them in the program. It was entirely comprised either shots of cows (close-ups, profiles, longer shots where you see more of the landscape, and them aggregated), or shots of the grass. He managed to get a ton of milage out of these two things, rhythmically and compositionally. The pace was fairly brisk, and at 40 minutes he really had a chance to build up a number of patterns and situtions, cutting between different times of the day. Cows seem to me a very suitable subject for cinema. If you can model the pace of your film around the pace of a cow's life, you're set. Randy mentioned that it would have made a great prelude to "Satantango."
5. Straits of Magellan: Drafts and Fragments [Panopticons] (more excerpts) More abstract, gentle everyday situations, a cat playing with (and mauling as well) a little bird, parks, that sort of thing.
6. Pas de Trois- Something about sex and flicker. Didn't make too much of an impression, it was done to better effect in something else I saw, maybe Arthur Lipsett? I dunno, too tired to look it up, it screened at Donell about a year and a half ago as a tribute to the Film Maker's Co-op.
6. Ingeimm Vibis Ipsa Pvella Fecit [Vernal Equinox] More motion studies. Same as above.
That's it, I think. Next week, when Matt comes down, I think we'll see more of the programs, there are four in all.
Sunday, September 07, 2003
Creative Documentaries (for Randy)
A short list of documentaries that push the boundaries, formally and materially. I had more in my head while I was doing dishes, but I'll add to it when I think of more:
All Chris Marker
All Harun Farocki
Asylum (documentary of experimental psychiatric community, showed at Anthology earlier this year, can't remember director's name)
The Act of Seeing With One's Own Eyes/Deus Ex- Stan Brakhage
Sherman's March- Ross McElwee
Night and Fog- Alain Resnais
Peter Watkins- Edvard Munch
Raul Ruiz- Miotte vu par Ruiz
All Dziga Vertov
The Brothers Kaufman- Rasmus Gerlach
A Propos de Nice, Jean Taris- Jean Vigo
Jonas Mekas- Walden
Mark Rappaport- From the Journal of Jean Seberg
----------------------
(and, this, excerpted from an old email by Jim Flannery [dude, if this bothers you, i'll take it out]):
Anything you can find by Johan van der Keuken. I saw a couple boxes at Le Video
the last time I was there, but I can't remember which films they included ... if
I wind up there later tonight I'll double check.
Wim Wenders _Notebooks on Cities and Food_, with its long contemplation of Ozu
(and its brief visit from Chris Marker).
Herzog, whose fiction films you were asking about ... _Lessons in Darkness_,
_Land of Silence and Darkness_, _Little Dieter Needs to Fly_ ... I know people
rate _Herdsmen of the Sun_ but it kinda feels like Riefenstahl's Masai book
(what is it with Germans and "noble savages", anyway), _La Soufrière_ (yes!),
_God's Angry Man_ ... more; not sure what's available on home video.
Edna Politta's _Le Quator des Possibles_, a documentary of the Arditti Quartet
rehearsing Nono's _Fragmente, Stille ... an Diotima_, one of the best films on
music I've ever seen (don't think it's on video but it oughta be, dammit).
---------------------------------------------------------------------
And, (saying this here 'cuz it's easier than in writing an email): Dion Workman/Julien Ottavi this thursday, should be unbelievably rad - http://www.thetanknyc.com
Now, off to Kant and Semantics - was hoping that I'd have time to blog about the Hollis Frampton films, but it seems a little unlikely.
All Chris Marker
All Harun Farocki
Asylum (documentary of experimental psychiatric community, showed at Anthology earlier this year, can't remember director's name)
The Act of Seeing With One's Own Eyes/Deus Ex- Stan Brakhage
Sherman's March- Ross McElwee
Night and Fog- Alain Resnais
Peter Watkins- Edvard Munch
Raul Ruiz- Miotte vu par Ruiz
All Dziga Vertov
The Brothers Kaufman- Rasmus Gerlach
A Propos de Nice, Jean Taris- Jean Vigo
Jonas Mekas- Walden
Mark Rappaport- From the Journal of Jean Seberg
----------------------
(and, this, excerpted from an old email by Jim Flannery [dude, if this bothers you, i'll take it out]):
Anything you can find by Johan van der Keuken. I saw a couple boxes at Le Video
the last time I was there, but I can't remember which films they included ... if
I wind up there later tonight I'll double check.
Wim Wenders _Notebooks on Cities and Food_, with its long contemplation of Ozu
(and its brief visit from Chris Marker).
Herzog, whose fiction films you were asking about ... _Lessons in Darkness_,
_Land of Silence and Darkness_, _Little Dieter Needs to Fly_ ... I know people
rate _Herdsmen of the Sun_ but it kinda feels like Riefenstahl's Masai book
(what is it with Germans and "noble savages", anyway), _La Soufrière_ (yes!),
_God's Angry Man_ ... more; not sure what's available on home video.
Edna Politta's _Le Quator des Possibles_, a documentary of the Arditti Quartet
rehearsing Nono's _Fragmente, Stille ... an Diotima_, one of the best films on
music I've ever seen (don't think it's on video but it oughta be, dammit).
---------------------------------------------------------------------
And, (saying this here 'cuz it's easier than in writing an email): Dion Workman/Julien Ottavi this thursday, should be unbelievably rad - http://www.thetanknyc.com
Now, off to Kant and Semantics - was hoping that I'd have time to blog about the Hollis Frampton films, but it seems a little unlikely.
Rules for Living
#1:
If you are only cooking for yourself, and you made a sizable amount of one dish, do not eat a second helping of said dish. Eat something else, because unless you are a supreme vituoso chef, then the taste of whatever you have made will likely be not as interesting at the end as it was at the beginning. Thus the law of dimishing marginal utlity applies to the palate as much as it applies to the market.
#2:
Do not tell a pretty girl that you hate animals. Do not compound the injury caused by then discussing how unintelligent that you think dogs are, and how they are bought affection. Especially when you are in a park, and there are a number of such animals walking by.
If you are only cooking for yourself, and you made a sizable amount of one dish, do not eat a second helping of said dish. Eat something else, because unless you are a supreme vituoso chef, then the taste of whatever you have made will likely be not as interesting at the end as it was at the beginning. Thus the law of dimishing marginal utlity applies to the palate as much as it applies to the market.
#2:
Do not tell a pretty girl that you hate animals. Do not compound the injury caused by then discussing how unintelligent that you think dogs are, and how they are bought affection. Especially when you are in a park, and there are a number of such animals walking by.
