[Frameworks] Film, Performance and Space?

[Jonathan Walley]

Richard,

A number of artists have taken space (as in literal space) and performance
(live performance, not acting on screen) as innate features or
characteristics of cinema. Projection performance assumes that the act of
exhibiting cinema is, in some sense, performative, and the resulting works
are intended as cinema not as "performance art." (That is, claiming a
performance aspect for cinema is not the same as calling it "performance
art" in the historical sense in which the latter term is typically used).
Bruce McClure, Sandra Gibson and Luis Recoder, Kerry Laitala, Sally
Golding, and others are examples. And don't forget Ken Jacobs and Tony
Conrad. Filmaktion, and related work by people like William Raban, Maclolm
Le Grice, Takahiko Iimura, Annabel Nicolson, and Takehisa Kosugi, also
fits, at least broadly. Frampton's "A Lecture" could be seen as a
progenitor of contemporary projection performance.

The same goes for space - the acknowledgement of the literal space of the
theater, or in some cases the gallery, has been a hallmark of much
cinematic work, including that of Paul Sharits, Anthony McCall, Lis Rhodes
(LIGHT MUSIC), to name a few. Several of the above filmmakers also apply,
including Gibson and Recoder and Bruce McClure.

I've gone with the "bigger" names here. But for everyone I've mentioned
there are scores of others whose work sees cinema as inherently "spatial"
and/or "performative."

Hope this helps.
Best,
Jonathan


On Wed, Sep 4, 2013 at 2:24 PM, Bernard Roddy <roddybp at yahoo.com> wrote:

>
> Richard, the call is strange, weird . . for taking it for granted that
> film and performance art have something in common.
>
> Space and film makes sense.  There's a cool essay by Beatriz Colomina on
> architecture, sexuality, and film in the volume she edited called Sexuality
> and Space.  That's cinema . . isn't it, at least as Sense of Cinema would
> have it?  I mean the architectural dimensions . . the architectural spaces
> of shots.  But Colomina is onto the importance of space for questions
> concerned with sexuality . .
>
> . . and then, then there's performance art.  I think of the Boston event
> in April called "Near death performance art experience."  Not an impartial
> choice, but certainly a very prominent one within American performance
> art.  What could such an event have to do with film?  And who, anyway,
> comes to mind when you think of performance art?  Aaaargh.  What is the
> relationship between such a practice in live performance, on one hand, and
> technology itself . . in general, not to speak of film in particular?
>
> There's no way around this abyss.  The doubt opens up before your
> dismissal of "documentation," Richard.  It's like a giant log right in your
> path.  And to go "beyond" that, like you invite us to, you know, what
> exactly does that mean . . that beyond that is a going along with a
> technology, with filmmaking?  What, after all, was it that was supposed to
> be going on in those events themselves?
>
> Better to go, perhaps, by way of a certain kind of figurative painting.
> The avant-garde in film suddenly looks to a time way, way, WAY before
> performance art . . or else it seeks to assuage this doubt with "expanded
> cinema."  But we have arrived at an expanded cinema that is now . .  in the
> theater itself!
>
> Bernie
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *Richard Ashrowan*
> *Mon Sep 2 13:07:17 UTC 2013*
> ------------------------------
>
> Hello all,
>
> I am trying to put together some screenings for the Edinburgh venue Summerhall, whose autumn theme is broadly 'Performance and Space', at quite short notice.
>
> I'm looking for filmworks, moving image or expanded cinema projects that relate to that theme in some meaningful way. Of course, it's a very broad theme...  I've been looking at various people associated with the London Filmaktion group (LFMC), plus works that have a strong component of performance art (those that go beyond 'documentation'). But I am also keen to find newer works in this territory, or some things from across the ocean.
>
> If anyone has any helpful suggestions, I would be glad to hear them, here or off-list.
>
> Many thanks,
>
> Richard
>
> Richard Ashrowan
> Creative Director
> Alchemy Film and Moving Image Festival
> 04.04.2014 - 06.04.2014
> Hawick, Scottish Borderswww.alchemyfilmfestival.org.ukwww.ashrowan.com
>
>
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> FrameWorks at jonasmekasfilms.com
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>
>


-- 
Jonathan Walley
Associate Professor
Department of Cinema
Denison University
walleyj at denison.edu
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