kagablog

By Mike Everleth

Bradford International Film Festival

The 16th annual Bradford International Film Festival, which will run March 18-28, is a total celebration of all forms of cinema, from classic films to modern world cinema to a tribute to Cinerama and more. But, most excitingly, is a bombastic collection of some of the best, most exciting underground films being made today.

From Bad Lit’s perspective, the most thrilling screening of the entire 10-day affair is the new film by British filmmaker Peter Whitehead, Terrorism Considered as One of the Fine Arts. In the U.S., Whitehead is a “lost” filmmaker from the underground’s heyday in the ’60s, being left out of most histories of the underground movement. Whitehead directed several influential films, including Wholly Communion and The Fall, before dropping out of filmmaking in the mid-’70s.

Film historian Jack Sargeant wrote extensively about and interviewed Whitehead for his wonderful book on Beat cinema, Naked Lens. Whitehead was also featured, along with South African filmmaker Aryan Kaganof, in the documentary By Any Old Light by Dionysos Andronis and Ca Ca Ca, although that doc hasn’t been seen much in the U.S.

According to the BIFF website, Terrorism Considered as One of the Fine Arts “is based around a mesmerising psychogeographical exploration of modern-day Vienna. The film incorporates a record of the subversive underbelly of the city into poetic meditations on conspiracy theory, eco-terrorism, time and cinema (the story of Carol Reed’s film The Third Man is retraced).”

Fittingly, the screening of Whitehead’s return will be preceded by another film by Dionysos Andronis, called Pandrogeny Manifesto, which features gender-bending artist Genesis P-Orridge and his wife Lady Jaye, filmed before her untimely death in 2007.

In addition to the Whitehead screening, there are loads of fantastic underground films from the U.S. screening at BIFF, many of which I’ve written about many, many times on Bad Lit.

read more here

*
5931 CHRISTOPHE-COLOMB
> ——————————————————–
>
> You are all invited
> to the launch of
> ‘LES SEPT ÂMES’
> magazine
>
> which includes
>
> an ode to Harry Crosby
> by Lamashtu
>
> a review of the book ‘Noise & Capitalism’
> by Blake Hargreaves
>
> a hypno-telepathic interview with Peter Whitehead
> par J. X. Roberts
>
> and some trashy industrial-faith images
>
>
>
>
> The evening begins with a 5 to 7 vernissage of
> Francis Ouellette (HOBO CULT RECORDS)’s
> collage work
>
> and will be followed by an informal mini-retrospective of films
> by
>
> CA CA CA
>
> BY ANY OLD LIGHT
> L’IMPASSE suivi de POUR EN FINIR AVEC LE JUGEMENT DE DIEU
> THE MAN WE WANT TO ANGER
>
> and the launch of the VHS label
> MODULI TV
>
> plus more if you snivel
>
> (accompanying DVDs include Peter Whitehead’s new film Terrorism Considered As One of the Fine Arts,
> A live performance by DEFLAG HEMOERRHAGE/HAIEN KONTRA
> an interview with Mattin
> a conference in Berlin about ‘Noise&Capitalism’
>
> and
>
> a noisy mash of short work bullshit by CA CA CA/LAMASHTU
>
>
> HOPE TO SEE YOU THERE

My love, do you recall the object which we saw,
That fair, sweet, summer morn!
At a turn in the path a foul carcass
On a gravel strewn bed,

Its legs raised in the air, like a lustful woman,
Burning and dripping with poisons,
Displayed in a shameless, nonchalant way
Its belly, swollen with gases.

The sun shone down upon that putrescence,
As if to roast it to a turn,
And to give back a hundredfold to great Nature
The elements she had combined;

And the sky was watching that superb cadaver
Blossom like a flower.
So frightful was the stench that you believed
You’d faint away upon the grass.

The blow-flies were buzzing round that putrid belly,
From which came forth black battalions
Of maggots, which oozed out like a heavy liquid
All along those living tatters.

All this was descending and rising like a wave,
Or poured out with a crackling sound;
One would have said the body, swollen with a vague breath,
Lived by multiplication.

And this world gave forth singular music,
Like running water or the wind,
Or the grain that winnowers with a rhythmic motion
Shake in their winnowing baskets.

The forms disappeared and were no more than a dream,
A sketch that slowly falls
Upon the forgotten canvas, that the artist
Completes from memory alone.

Crouched behind the boulders, an anxious dog
Watched us with angry eye,
Waiting for the moment to take back from the carcass
The morsel he had left.

— And yet you will be like this corruption,
Like this horrible infection,
Star of my eyes, sunlight of my being,
You, my angel and my passion!

Yes! thus will you be, queen of the Graces,
After the last sacraments,
When you go beneath grass and luxuriant flowers,
To molder among the bones of the dead.

Then, O my beauty! say to the worms who will
Devour you with kisses,
That I have kept the form and the divine essence
Of my decomposed love!

translated by : William Aggeler, The Flowers of Evil (Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1954)

“L’amour aux toilettes” de Stewart Home, dans la collection “Intoxication, L’écriture sous stupéfiants” sous la direction de Toni Davidson, éditions “Au Diable Vauvert”, Vauvert (France), 2002

Stewart Home est un écrivain anglais ayant plusieurs points communs au niveau du style et de la thématique avec Aryan Kaganof. Malgré le fait que Toni Davidson a fait le choix de cette anthologie de nouvelles (Davidson est l’auteur de “Gay Scotland” et “Queer World”), cette nouvelle de Stewart Home se base à l’univers macho, comme plusieurs romans de Stewart Home dont nous avons déjà parlé au kagablog :

http://kaganof.com/kagablog/2007/09/09/%c2%ab-peter-whitehead-et-stewart-home-ensemble-%c2%bb/

Le langage argotique de Home est très frais et très direct: “Lindsay tenait encore la plus grande partie du manche dans sa main” (op.cit. page 166). Rien à voir avec “la manche” des nos habits (ndlr). Le brio et le talent d’écriture de Stewart Home sont tout à fait compatibles avec le “brouillon artistique” de son style inimitable, qui a plusieurs points communs avec celui de James Moffat (alias Richard Allen). En tant que critique d’art, Home a plusieurs fois défendu le Néoisme, un courant artistique canadien né dans les années 70 par Istvan Kantor (alias Monty Kantsin), un artiste qui est devenu par la suite proche de notre “Cinéma Abattoir” :

http://kaganof.com/kagablog/2008/11/22/beuys-die-revolution-sind-wir-we-are-the-revolution-kantor-und-wir-auch-and-we-too/

Dans son CV à la fin de cette anthologie de nouvelles, Home écrit: “Il est célibataire, habite Londres et n’a jamais pu garder un emploi” (op.cit, page 274). C’est un point commun que nous partageons avec lui et c’est maintenant que nous l’avons appris.

Le point à souligner c’est que l’écrivain est aussi un”barfly” (pour utiliser un autre mot argotique cher à Bukowski), tout comme Kaganof qui en parle souvent dans ses romans comme “Hectic (Agité)” ou Pierres encore (Stones Again)”. Il a lui aussi une manie avec les excréments (qui était un des sujets favoris de Kaganof dans les années 90, voir l’article d’Immanuel Stammelman) et le contenu érotique fort et macho. C’est pour ça que les trois fois que nous assistons comme lecteurs à ses “amours aux toilettes”, c’est avec des filles différentes: 1. au début chez la riche Emma mais avec la belle Lindsay, 2. au club reggae avec deux nanas inconnues et 3. chez Emma encore une fois et avec elle-même enfin !

Après “Slow Death” et “Blow Job”, c’est sa troisième fiction (roman ou nouvelle) pour nous à lire traduite en français ou en grec. Stewart Home est sûrement un de nos auteurs préférés !

écrit par Dionysos Andronis

Peter Whitehead was born in 1937 in Liverpool. Even if he has not made films since 1978 he remains, however, the most important representative of the avant-garde cinema in the UK. And this is so, even though he has shot films other than experimental films. Peter Whitehead is among that group of film makers who have shaken the European film making scene. Despite his hasty cessation of his film making activities, Whitehead continues, even today, to influence the young experimental film makers in Europe as well as in the USA.

In order to prove this thesis, let’s place in parallel the film making work of Peter Whitehead to the work of five young experimental film makers, four European (Isaac Julien, Mara Mattuschka, Ian Kerkhof, Dionysos Andronis) and one American only: Richard Kern. Let’s concentrate on a few aesthetic common points which will feed our debate.

Whitehead has inherited the aesthetic novelties of the ‘Cinema Direct’ and he has transferred them poetically into his own films. The use of a lightweight camera, also the minimum of persons working in the film crew - the camera man, the sound engineer, etc. - Whitehead has replaced them with one person.
In this way, in practically all his films, Whitehead is the only one in charge during the shooting. This gives to his films a great/strong flexibility in the camera movement which can appear brutal but which is, in reality, very astonishing and efficient. In Wholly Communion (1965 - 33 min) the successive zoom in/zoom out on the readers at the Albert Hall Festival of Poetry breaks the aesthetic rules of television documentary and introduces a creative dialogue between the audience and the film.

In the same way, Richard Kern (born 1954) is happy to film events being the only person in the film crew. This has not, however, reduced his competence as a film maker nor the length of his films. In Right Side Of My Brain (1984) the camera runs for 30 minutes following the characters in the intentionally unlit interior and exterior scenes. This helps to underline the psychological instability of the heroin as well as the darkness of her soul.

Whitehead is content to record the artistic documents by practising their placement in the abyss. In the Benefit Of The Doubt (1967 - 60 min) Whitehead emphasizes the distance between the audience and the filmed theatrical show (the play Us of Peter Brook) by complicating, with his new stage direction, his starting point. Equally, in Wholly Communion it is the recited poetry which defines the protagonists, whilst in Daddy it is the sculptures of Niki de St. Phalle. The eye of the film-maker filters with a new touch of distance the pre-existing artistic production.

The Bulgarian-Austrian ‘Mara Mattuschka’ (born in 1959) on the instruction of Peter Whitehead made the same use of documentary recordings. Her hysterical monologues are accentuated by the double stage direction of the film producer (who does not fail to complicate the narrative structures thanks to the game played between the improvised and the non-improvised. Her film Cerolax reminds us of the Benefit Of The Doubt where “this new art form, let’s say, emphasizes in the comedian a new notion of responsibility, taking into accounts all the facts. If, of course, the written dialogue exists, it can happen that the actor overrides it by using his own inspiration, his own exaltation, his indignation, his dream … “(in Positif Magazine …)

By mixing intentionally the cinema to other art forms, Peter Whitehead becomes the defender of a new form of cinema which is not ‘multi-media’ art, nor is it mainstream cinema but something rather more powerful. The Wholly Communion film is full of recited poems which completes the poetic values of the movie format. It is not by chance that it also exists in a collection of poems published the same year (1965) by Lorrimer.

The same is for Benefit Of The Doubt which is neither theatre nor cinema. As for the latter, if we are dealing with a filmed play, it is nevertheless taken from the seventh art, in so far as it takes a visual depth, a photogenic, and intensified image, a dimension of movement which is in part lost in the theatre (op. cit) - Mattuschka also escapes the theatre image with her personal way of using the out-of-focus as well as using jerky and neurotic shots.
In all Peter Whitehead films the frequent use of hard rock music backing is obvious. This type of music inspires him directly - not because of its mass popularity but rather for its power as well as its utopian dimension. This last dimension makes the link with its aesthetic propositions. The direct inspiration of the hard rock music attributes to several of his scenes the character of a ‘cine-clip’ belonging to a bigger production, but rather than utilising the aesthetic of the video clip which has all the artifices of technology, with Peter Whitehead the cine-clips incorporated in his films are shot in the manner of a craftsman using one camera only.

In the film Tonite Let’s All Make Love In London (1967) there is an original cine- clip sequence shot by Peter Whitehead with The Rolling Stones and their song We Love You.

Across the reconstruction by the members of the group of the condemnation scene of Oscar Wilde locked in prison the director places the first stone of his edifice - the theme of the film pins on the sexual liberty of this revolutionary epoch and its negative defeat by the media.

It is true that the cine-clip has remained famous thanks to its simplicity of presentation but also for its economy as regards the requirements of the mass public.

The Whitehead cine-clip aesthetic has directly influenced many recent film makers. Even Derek Jarman used a similar method in Edward II (1991) where Annie Lennox is filmed using only one panoramic shot.

The caricature is a stylistic intention of Peter Whitehead in his film Daddy (1973). Niki de St. Phalle holds the leading role pretending to be Lili Marlene whilst the other actors are very grotesque. The character of the Colonel father incorporates the power (and its parody) whilst his military uniform is always accentuated. Niki is also very caricatured by wearing cartoon clothes. Peter Whitehead achieves very well the expression of the eternal violence between the two sexes and has shown to us that this violence is unavoidable since the two sexes are inseparable and inter- dependants.

This metaphorical use of human caricature in order to suggest the oppressive rapport of the sexual battle is very similar in the work of Kern. In all of Kern’s films one can find the roles of executioner and victim which are attributed most of the time to a man and a woman respectively. It is not by chance that both authors have been attacked by feminists, especially in Kern’s work, who is the king of the 1980s (meta-punk) cinema. The sex acquires a negative and prerogative interpretation - as in all the musical and social movements of the same name - with Kern sex is represented as a socially oppressive instrument, as well as submission of the individual. The sexist aspect of his films aims to reveal the disgusting side of forced sex in the bosom of contemporary male chauvinistic society. Sometimes these images become very violent and sexist and this is done to inform us of the true sadistic character that human relations have obtained. The scene of his film The Evil Cameraman (1990 - 10 min) where we can see at the end a woman tied up and tortured by a man who slips and falls onto the ground, are very similar to those scenes of Daddy beating up his wife and also seen sticking a sword in her arse in front of the eyes of their stupefied daughter.

This attitude of provocation which permeates sex, in common in both of the two authors, can also have a feminine interpretation. Niki de St. Phalle speaks of this: “The agent had lots of personal problems in connection with this film, being rather misogynous, he wanted to say ’see how women really are - they are sick’; ‘this is what they want to do to us: paralyse us’; ‘we must fight back, they are all crazy and psychopaths’. In fact to do this was an act of vengeance. I was not at all in agreement.” (In Ecran Magazine No.28 Aug/Sep 1974 p 32)

In the manner of a fanatical anarchist Peter Whitehead draws his set of themes through the brutality of power which permeates many different examples: the police for The Fall (1969 - 110 n), the father-master for Daddy (1973 - 90 min), the media for Tonite Let’s All Make Love In London (1967 - 70 min). His constant reference on this topic is more evident in The Fall, which is a militant documentary of a great poetic value, a film which maintains its actuality.
Having participated in the student revolution at Columbia University in New York in April of 1968 and having filmed their collective manifestation as well as their brutal interruption because of the transgression of the university campus by the New York police, Peter Whitehead offers us a testament which was going to influence several militant anarchist documentarists in Europe.

The Englishman Isaac Julian (born in 1960) made his debut in 1983 with the medium length documentary Who Has Killed Colin Roach? (35 min) which has as its theme the assassination of a black militant by the Ku Klux Klan and the suspect role of the police.

Also, his following documentary Looking for Langston Hughes (1984 - 46 min) has a similar theme. His work as a reporter reminds us of a Peter Whitehead film by the fact of the active participation in the protestors events.

It is this anarchist ideology which pushes Peter Whitehead to denounce the atrocities committed by a ‘Marxiste’ generation of the ’60s and during the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s. But he does it in an allegorical and shocking way - his last film Fire On The Water (1978 - 90 min) is based on the same motive. The final scene summarizes everything : a chicken is tortured by a pianist who tries to accompany the song from The Doors The End - symbol of this generation of ex-anti authority who have now become oppressors, with the help of the chicken’s body - the chicken parts are slowly tearing apart.

The pornography together with hints of sadomasochism in the film Daddy has not only influenced Richard Kern but even more so the Dutchman Ian Kerkhof (born in 1964). In relation to this subject Peter Whitehead is advanced: ’sexuality is for me like a theatre. Pornography is like a sacred dance, the latest ulterior image of beauty’ (In Entropy No.1 p14). This way, the images of Daddy tied up on a chair, having to eat his own excrements whilst his vengeful daughter practices in front of him a lesbian sketch - the images are replaced in Kerkhof’s work by those of a killer who, in the film Ten Monologues of the Lives of the Serial Killers (1994 - 54 min) masturbates himself in front of the camera whilst telling us of his disgusting acts. This film has obtained the first prize in the 5th week of the experimental cinema of Madrid in April ‘95.

The conglomeration of the symbols is obvious in each of Whitehead’s films, especially in Daddy. The film sets have Freudian connotations which are created by Niki de St. Phalle in an intentionally excessive manner. For example, all the stuffed animals (even the rats) which are parts of the father’s collection are destined to underline a special feeling for each scene.

In my film The Lamp (1994 - 13 min) it is exactly this rich atmosphere with Freudian connotations directly inspired by Peter Whitehead which I wanted to recreate. The icon of Christ filled with traces of lipstick, the ugly faces of the Christians believing in different ideas, aim only to reveal the misery of a sexually oppressed universe, which is in contrast to the one in which a young couple frolic behind a bush in the same area.

These examples proving the influence exercised by Peter Whitehead on the new generation of experimental film makers do not stop here. The TV documentary The Falconer, produced by Channel 4 of BBC confirm this and can give also new reference points.

this article first published here

l’attention alimente la névrose
pas la solution

traduit par Dionysos Andronis

At the Friday following (4 March), internationally acclaimed South African film-maker, artist and writer, Aryan Kaganof, gave a stimulating lecture on the genealogy of the “digital underground” illustrated with screenings of influential short films including ANTINOOS by Dionysos Andronis – Greece (1991); SUBSTITUTION No.4 by Kiki Picasso - France (2002); and POEMS THAT SHOOT by Catherine Henegan - South Africa (2004).

Kaganof concluded his presentation by showing his award winning documentary WESTERN 4.33. The documentary investigates the German concentration camps in Namibia where the indigenous Herero population were massacred in the early part of the 20th Century. Soundtrack includes music by Lamonte Young, John Cage, Friedrich Nietzsche, Macy Gray, Jesus Rodriguez and South Africa’s own extreme noise terror outfit, Virgins.

more info here

Ce film court de Aryan Kaganof est une méditation sur la vie, sur l’histoire et l’art. Un écran blanc et fragmenté commence très lentement à se transformer et à prendre forme. La musique minimaliste de Martin Bladh pendant les 6 minutes du film crée un suspense émotionnel et méditatif. Dès le début on aperçoit au fond un visage humain. Si on n’a pas lu le titre entier du film, on ne devine pas encore la personne. C’est seulement à la fin qu’on voit une image moins floue du célèbre et jeune tueur en série Cho qui s’est suicidé aussi, comme le grand peintre Rothko du titre.

Le thème du tueur en série revient souvent chez Kaganof depuis le début de sa carrière. Cette fois les connotations sont un peu différentes. C’est la deuxième fois que Cho revient dans un film de Kaganof et le titre “Des Grands suicides américains” ne veut pas dire “des suicides médiatiques” mais plutôt “des suicides nobles”. On connait les sentiments anti-américains de Kaganof depuis longtemps. La citation finale de Rothko dans ce film serait “Je ne suis pas un peintre abstrait….. Je m’intéresse à rendre la tragédie, l’extase et la destinée”. On comprend très bien que la première phrase fait référence au statut ambigu du film qui commence abstrait et qui finit figuratif à la fin. Mais avec la dernière phrase de Rothko qu’est-ce que Kaganof voulait connotait indirectement ? Peut-être que les Etats Unis sont en train de vivre le tragédie de leur propre destinée, de leur propre fin ? Cette interprétation plairait aussi à Oussama Ben Laden mais (si on passe de l’autre côté) à plusieurs intellectuels humanistes d’aujourd’hui.

écrit par Dionysos ANDRONIS

a big thank you to dionysos andronis for sending this article as a digital file!

Ivan Zulueta was one important spanish filmmaker of the “democratic” era of his country. We saw his second feature “Arrebato” (Rapture) in Madrid a long time ago, during a very old edition of the “Semana de cine experimental” (Experimental cinema week). The film was directed in 1979 and it was a really underground feature. Zulueta was 66 years old.

coetzee, en manque d’amour pour les gens
est toujours fatiguant, n’importe
comment intelligente

est l’écriture desséchée
pour les vieux hommes blancs qui sont aigrement
presqu’à la fin de leur période de règne

ak

traduction diionysos andronis

This short film by Kaganof was made in November 2008 during the three-day seminar of the same name at the University of Malmo from 2nd – 4th November. Compared with earlier works in his filmography, this one is very different. It is also slightly ironic. This hint of irony also makes it different. It is gentle and discreet and becomes especially obvious at the end of film when the director appears in front of the camera, giving us an “optimistic” thumbs’ up. Michael Blake’s music is just as gentle and sporadic as the resulting irony. This backs up a poem by the director which appeared a few days later on the KagaBlog – “most academics aren’t intellectuals, they’re intellect managers” (see “How I died (again)” of 15th December 2008).

Among the academics attending the seminar we can make out Anne-Marie Duguet, Lajos Varhegyi, Michael Heim, Dick Hebdige and various others. They are all turning towards the camera at the start of the film before leaving the scene to Kaganof. Nobody cites their names, either during the film or in the credits! We’d met Anne-Marie Duguet at the Parisian festival “Astarti” in 1998. She is professor at the Sorbonne and specialises in video art. She also directs the wonderful theoretical series “Anarchives”, whose ambiguous title achieves its aim. This same ambiguity characterises most of Kaganof’s creations. The American Michael Heim is also a composer and the nature and quality of his art (like that of our aforementioned idol) could take the seminar in a new direction. The most famous professor at the seminar had to be Dick Hebdige, an Englishman working the States. He is also the darling (among others) of the hugely influential Palais de Tokyo in Paris, which has made reference to his writing several times. “He is particularly interested in the white working class and its subcultures in relation to music, from teddy boys to mods, from rockers to punks and skinheads” (in “Palais” N° 7, Paris, Autumn 2008, page 90). His incredibly famous work “Subculture: The Meaning of Style” has just been translated into French for the first time – an inadmissible thirty years after it appeared in English. “The translated version of the text, now available from publishers La Découverte, enables us to assess, thirty years late, the decompartmentalisation of cultural studies’ disciplines, from which France has distanced itself for such a long time” (Gallien Dejean, in “Zéro Deux” (Nantes), N°49, Spring 2009, page 35).

To return to our argument at the start on Kaganovian irony, which has a new socio-political dimension this time, let us quote once again from the poem “How I died (again)”, inspired by this encounter:
“i can’t
be the only one
who’s onto what an
extraordinary waste of
time and energy this gathering
is?”

The film “New Media Politics – Experiment number 1” is not only available on the famous KagaBlog, but also on You Tube.

Written by Dionysos Andronis, translated by Lucy Lyall Grant

In early 2009, Kaganof made three new short films, his main concern being to shatter the appearances of the banal through Art. His first three films this year are marked, once again, by the grace of their creation. This grace is always existential. The Artist IS his Art. And the cinematic poetic characteristics tend slightly more towards the everyday, especially for the first two films, “Jeanette Ginslov” and “Seven Days at the Silbersteins & What is Opera?”

“Jeanette Ginslov: this is a performance guys!” introduces us to the poetically reproduced everyday life of a gym teacher. The video images are meticulously filled with excessive colour and throbbing with inner life. Someone taking part in this free performance has an attack but she is rapidly replaced with images of a reassuring smile at the end.

“Seven days at the Silbersteins & What is Opera” is a friendly gesture paying homage to the tenth wedding anniversary of Christine Lucia and Michael Blake. Kaganof’s camera observes them from the same angle, both singing a piece from an opera in the making. The colours change while the camera remains in more or less the same spot. A cry drowns out the second title “What is Opera?” The serene faces of the couple of musicians are the sign of a classic creation, modern and calm, but, as the cry seems to suggest, with an inner originality.

“The Dancer and his Double Arrive at the Gates of Heaven” is a dance film, borne with the brio of Helgé Janssen. The musical score contains pieces by Matmos, Tomoko Mukayiama and the experimental group African Noise Foundation. Janssen first appears lying on the ground, and then begins his impressive dance. With his lens moving at an angle, Kaganof observes the dancer’s every graceful gesture. Janssen combines strength and agility. The greyish images which come and go add a new language, very close to that of Kaganof’s artistic creations which frame this performance like a set. Kaganof’s letters on the gallery’s walls, which the audience can’t make out, refer to the inaccessible dimension of the artist’s work and his desire to give a complex dimension to an apparently simple performance. “His Double”, as the title says, is his “ghostly” shadow. Janssen is somewhat stylised by the supernatural slowness and the almost expressionist lighting. It is, however, the shadow of a serene, calm artist. This justifies the opening phrase of this article, “to shatter the appearances of the banal through Art.”

Written by Dionysos ANDRONIS, translated by Lucy Lyall Grant

This feature-length documentary by Aryan Kaganof was filmed in 2008 with sets from the film “WInterland”, although the editing was only completed this year. Yet another masterpiece from Kaganof, although here the film writing is more conventional than in the author’s earlier films. Kaganof is a fan of the Dutch director Dick Tuinder, and together they devised this fiction documentary as a “making of” Tuinder’s first feature film. We met them both in Amsterdam in August 2008. They were stopping over in the capital as “Winterland” was filmed in the Dutch countryside. Tuinder and his famous producer Gijs Van Der Westelaken * had just been to the Dutch premiere of “SMS Sugar Man” in the beautiful iLLUSEUM gallery on the 9th August 2008.

The film starts with a quotation from Jean Baudrillard from his book “Fragments”, translated into English. The quotation appears as a work of art rewritten by Kaganof on the film’s interior sets. It begins “There are two-way mirrors which allow you innocently to spy on people”. This sums up the philosophy of the shoot. Tuinder’s entire film seems to be a play of illusions on deceptive appearances and their “innocent” cinematic reproductions. It is also the subject of Tuinder’s earlier short film, “Most Things Never Happen” which we watched at the South African “National Arts Festival” in August 2005 during the “Dionysiac film” retrospective.

The spectators are first manipulated with the appearance of the main character, the young Kiriko Mechanicus, who in reality is an alter ego of Sally de Winter, Tuinder’s favourite teenage actress. Here the young Kiriko becomes the incarnation of Sally, offering us a secondary path of reflection about appearances. She caresses a giant eye hanging from the set which is used as a superior surveillance or observation eye.

Dick Tuinder buys a book with the single word “Civilization” (in English) as its title, and he moves around among the sets, going from one actor to another. “We’re going to find the solution to the editing”, the insert titles tell us in Dutch in the middle of the film. He then wanders through the forest in the night, thinking about how he will stage his film. This is parallel action which helps us change location and appearances so as not to betray the “realism” of the cinematic device. Even the costume maker is not spared the principle of filmed interviews. The great actor Thom Jansen returns throughout the film to comment on the positive developments.

And at the end of the documentary, Kaganof asks the director an important question - a question which sums up this game of appearances, “Do you enjoy playing the role of Dick Tuinder?”

This is a simple masterpiece which does not provide answers to the problematics of the original film, but which takes us on a beautiful stroll through an artistic landscape of escapism.

Written by Dionysos Andronis, translated by Lucy Lyall Grant

*Westelaken produced Theo Van Gogh’s last, controversial films and gave several interviews on international TV after Van Gogh was murdered in 2004.

These two short films directed by Aryan Kaganof in 2009 are directly inspired by the musical universe of the composer Michael Blake. The first opens with images of a cobweb, its owner swinging within. The images that follow in parallel are extremely pure and thrilling, in perfect harmony with the score of the first composition, Blake’s “French Suite”. A river runs joyfully like a constant, gentle melody, like the days in an ordinary yet gracious life. The motionless stones and pebbles on the riverbed symbolise the hidden “immobility”, in contrast with the flowing water. The film lasts for 7 minutes, and its title makes us think of the metaphor for a new strategy to structure our human society. A tramp confirms this at the end, saying “I really want to get out of here”.

“Prolegomena to a history of time” is the second part of this diptych. This time the composer Michael Blake has set to music the text of the same name by the philosopher Martin Heidegger (written in 1925) using a “dysnarrative”, in other words, intentionally interrupted by Jill Richard’s interpretation which does not, however, detract from the original musical “intrigue”. The reference to the philosopher Martin Heidegger (who joined the Nazi Party in 1933) does not have any negative connotations as this film is a metaphor for life, just like the first film. In parallel editing we can see scraps of sky, clearings and trees surrounding a graveyard of cars, lost in the middle of a forest. Kaganof’s filming is once again throbbing with life as it observes the graveyard, highlighting the emotional and dramatic contrast. The wrecks of abandoned cars are a sign suggesting approaching death and the resurrection to come. The film lasts for 10 minutes (as does Blake’s composition of the same name) and these ten minutes are the mark of a solid, round figure, like the trees in the forest and the imagination of the duo Kaganof-Blake. By the end, the image becomes fragmented, suggesting the apparent-latent unity of the diptych. We see a square of cloudy sky, surrounded by a black frame.

Written by Dionysos Andronis , translated by Lucy Lyall Grant

This is a photo from my film APPRENTICESHIP (Apprentissage). It is a 1967 photo and I was a newborn baby .

Peter Whitehead hadn’t made a film for 32 years – his last film dates back to 1977. Now, he’s back behind the camera to bring us the film of his latest novel of the same name. In this feature-length film of 2h35, Whitehead portrays an icy town which is nonetheless peopled with the feminine graces of several young actresses. Above all, it is a portrait of Vienna today. Its hero is Michael Schlieman, an MI6 agent working with the British Secret Services to solve the mystery of why several operations failed in the past. There are points in common with the sinking of Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior and the murder of a photo-journalist from the same organisation. Schlieman is part of an eco-terrorist group and Whitehead, his alter-ego, shows us that his novel is based on “fear and control, or better still, about the fear that the state spreads in order to control” (from the Viennale 2009 Catalogue).

The film opens in Vienna’s Third Man Museum where Schlieman has come to question a beautiful young archivist, played by Sophie Strohmeier. He is hoping to use this research to write a novel. The archivist ends up playing the role of interpreter for his contacts. The colour blue is present in several scenes of this river city, and lines of Seferis and Kazantzakis’ poetry are superimposed on the image. The lines are an accompaniment to the fluidity of the narrative.

Schlieman has to find the young Maria Lenoir, the daughter of Nora, the main character in one of Whitehead’s earlier novels published in 1990, “Nora and …”. A mystical spinning top spins throughout the film, and the local band Black Flash performs its songs while Schlieman’s monologue constantly causes us to lose our bearings. Most scenes are accompanied by instrumental music composed by Whitehead himself.

The film is directed in a way that is different from Whitehead’s earlier films. The images are not packed with formal research on the aesthetics of destruction, but the poetic sensation here comes from the structure of this complicated, multi-layered story. At the end of the third section, Schlieman is found assassinated, without any answers to his questions at the start of the film. His body is lying on the seat of a carriage in the Vienna subway. A line from Homer tells us that “Blue death closes his eyes” – this is the third Greek poet quoted in the film. We filmed the “making of” the latest feature-length film and Whitehead told us that “together, the people he questioned are plotting his murder” (op.cit. “By any old light” published on kagablog, 07-10-08).

“After having destroyed the Third World now we are also destroying this planet” (Whitehead, op.cit. from the Viennale 2009 Catalogue).

Written by Dionysos Andronis, translated by Lucy Lyall Grant

http://www.cinematheque.fr/fr/projections/archives/fiche-manifestation/peter-whitehead,10885.html

PETER WHITEHEAD

2009 - 153’’

Le résumé :

Evénement : Peter Whitehead présente ses deux derniers films, son plus court (Un film…) et son plus long (Terrorism Considered as One of the Fine Arts), tous deux liés et en prolongement du chef d’oeuvre The Fall. Deux essais romanesques sur les dimensions politique, idéologique, technologique et psychique de l’image telles qu’elles ont caractérisé la première décennie du XXIe siècle, iconophile jusqu’à la démence et que les cinéastes, experts en matière de représentation et de montage, furent peutêtre le mieux à même de ressaisir.

Séance présentée par Nicole Brenez et Antoine Thirion.

Un film…
de Peter Whitehead
Grande-Bretagne/2009/3′/vidéo
Contribution au film collectif Outrage & Rébellion.

Terrorism Considered as One of the Fine Arts: A Dialogue Between Peter Whitehead and Sophie Strohmeier
de Peter Whitehead
GB/2009/150′/vidéo
Libre adaptation par l’auteur de son roman éponyme, paru chez Hathor Publishing en 2007. “Le vrai but de l’avant-garde doit être de fomenter et accomplir des actes de guerre. Nommez-les “Terrorisme” si vous voulez. L’avant-garde doit englober un théâtre urbain permanent de violence ciblée, une violation méditée des formes frigides et stériles. Mais sa stratégie requiert finesse et subtilité. Un dernier cri – un appel à l’action déguisé en art. Car nous sommes en guerre. Il n’existe pas de paix, sauf en imagination. L’art ne concerne pas l’art, même célébrant l’inouï ; il doit être politique. Comment ? À l’ère où images et artefacts sont consommés aussi vite que du papier toilette ? Comment l’art peut-il provoquer l’action directe ? La seule question qui importe (hormis celle du suicide), ainsi que Jean- Lucifer Godard l’a montré et prouvé grâce à ce suprême artefact d’avantgarde qu’est La Chinoise est celle-ci : comment un film peut-il mobiliser à la fois la population de la Sorbonne et le peuple des travailleurs en France, comment peut-il les armer de chansons et de slogans poétiques, d’images disloquantes, de mots ardents et autres sabres pour découper et démembrer le réel ? (…) L’ “art” d’avant-garde doit aspirer à être dangereux, belliqueux et direct. Comment ramener de la réalité, affronter l’holocauste de la virtualité universelle, rendre l’homme et la femme de la rue heureux et comblés de se sentir réels ?” Peter Whitehead, mai 2006.
Pour le reste, cf : www.nohzone.net

Vendredi 11 Décembre 2009 - 20h00 - SALLE HENRI LANGLOIS - Vidéo
En présence de Peter Whitehead

reverend steven leyba and dionysos andronis

Peter Whitehead n’avait pas filmé depuis 32 ans. Son avant-dernier film datait de 1977. Maintenant il retourne derrière la caméra pour nous transférer à l’écran son dernier roman éponyme. Dans ce long métrage de 2h35, Whitehead nous livre le portait d’une ville glaciale mais peuplée par les grâces féminines de plusieurs jeunes actrices. C’est avant tout le portrait de Vienne d’aujourd’hui. Il y incarne le rôle d’un agent MI6 Michael Schlieman qui travaille pour les services secrets britanniques afin d’élucider le mystère et l’echec des plusieurs opérations du passé. Il y a des points communs sur l’épave du Ranbow Warrior de Greenpeace et le meurtre d’un photographe-reporter de la même organisation. Schlieman fait partie d’un groupe de terrorisme écologique et son alter ego Whitehead nous révèle que son roman est centré sur “la peur et le contrôle ou plutôt sur la peur que l’état diffuse afin d’assurer son contrôle (dans le catalogue de la Viennale 2009).

Le film commence avec la Cinémathèque de Vienne et Schlieman qui y vient poser des questions à une belle et jeune documentaliste, interpretée par Sophie Strohmeier. Cette recherche aimerait aboutir à l’écriture d’un roman. La documentaliste jouera surtout le rôle de l’interprète à ses contacts. La couleur bleue est présente dans plusieurs scènes de la ville fluviale et les vers de Seferis et Kazantzakis sont suimposés à l’image. Ces vers accompagnent la fluidité du récit.

Schlieman doit retrouver la jeune Maria Lenoir, la fille de Nora qui était le personnage central d’un autre roman plus ancien de Whitehead, publié en 1990 “Nora and…”. Une belle toupie mystique tourne pendant le film et le groupe local Black Flash chante ses chansons pendant que le monologue de Schlieman ne cesse de renverser les points de répère. La musique instrumentale composée par Whitehead accompagne la plupart des scènes.

Il y a une différence sur le plan de la mise en scène avec les films anciens du cinéaste. Les images ne sont pas pleines de recherches formelles basées sur l’esthètique de la déstruction. Mais la sensation poétique est basée maintenant sur la structure de cette histoire compliquée et à plusieurs niveaux.

A la fin de la troisième partie Schlieman sera retrouvé mort assassiné sans réponse à ses questions du début. Son corps est allongé sur le siège d’un wagon du métro viennois. Et le vers d’Homère nous assure que “la mort bleue ferme ses yeux”. C’est le troisième poète grec dans le film. Nous avions filmé le “making of” du nouveau long métrage et Whitehead nous assurait que “les personnes interrogées sont en train de monter le film de sa mort” (op.cit. “By any old light” publié sur le kagablog du 07-10-08).

“Nous avons détruit le Tiers Monde et nous détrusions maintenant la planète” (Whitehead, op.cit. dans la catalogue de la Viennale 2009).

écrit par Dionysos Andronis

Le film “Pearls before swine” de Richard Wolstencroft est une production de 1999 et c’est son troisième long métrage. Il a fait un nouveau (un quatrième) cette année mais nous espérons le voir bientôt. Le cinéaste australien Wolstencroft joue aussi un petit rôle dans ce film, celui de Julius Vollmer abattu par la mafia, mais il est crédité au générique comme Richard Masters.

Le titre du film vient directement de l’évangile selon Saint Mathieu et de cette phrase disant “ne jetez pas des perles aux cochons” (chapitre 7, verset 6). Les intégristes chrétiens étaient le sujet secondaire de son premier long métrage “Bloodlust” (1992) qui est maintenant incorporé dans cette nouvelle édition “K-Films” (1) mais qui était aussi commercialisé en France avant par la société défunte “Haxan”.

Le protagoniste est Boyd Rice, le musicien industriel “NON”. Il incarne dans ce film le rôle d’un tueur professionnel d’idéologie fasciste qui se met en oeuvre en compagnie de deux autres mafieux et fachos comme lui pour commettre des crimes. Ils commencent par les jeunes SDF qui dorment dans la rue et ils continuent plus tard avec les performers d’une troupe marginale.

Le mafieux Daniel Wingrove (incarné par Boyd Rice) a une prédilection pour le sexe SM, tout comme ses copines. Il est pourtant un peu “intellectuel” et il aime beaucoup lire l’écrivain controversé Morton Bugs qui deviendra la prochaine cible pour lui et pour ses assistants. Ils recevront une commande de l’assassiner. Sur la route ils croiseront un camion immatriculé “RW 666″. RW sont sûrement les initiales du cinéaste et le chiffre “magique” aimerait désigner aussi l’affiliation du protagoniste Rice (mais pas seulement) à l’”église du Satan”. L’image d’Anton LaVey (le fondateur de cette église) apparaît en rayon dans une librairie sur la couverture d’un livre, à côté des livres de Morton Bugs.

L’écrivain Morton Bugs sera finalement abattu ? Nous n’allons pas vous révéler la fin mais nous allons seulement vous dire que le même acteur incarne les deux : le mafieux Wingrove et l’écrivain Bugs. Le passeport de Bugs écrit sa nationalité sudafricaine. Pourquoi ce choix ?

Dans ce film les répliques fascistes de tous les genres vont et viennent. Nous allons réproduire seulement une seule homophobe et racontée par un ami yuppie de Wingrove : ” Je te parle des PD (ndlr:c’est écrit comme ça aux sous-titres). Je pense que la maladie du sida est un cadeau de Dieu. …. / Je pense qu’un groupe de fondamentalistes réligieux serait d’accord avec toi. / … Parce que le sida est une arme de guerre. Dans le domaine de l’art, les plus grands agitateurs sont les PD…. Je te parle de ces PD agitateurs comme Mapplethorpe, Jarman…” A noter que Jarman était un de nos cinéastes préférés !
Pendant le générique de la fin, on voit des remerciements à Genesis P-Orridge qui était l’inventeur de la musique industrielle (le genre pratiqué par Boyd Rice) et le protagoniste-scénariste de notre film précédent. La phrase finale du même générique de fin serait “A l’Aube Nouvelle”.

écrit par Dionysos Andronis

(1) “K-Films” était la société qui avait organisé dans le passé le festival parisien important FFF (Festival du Film Fétichiste), un festival qui n’existe plus aujourd’hui. Les organisateurs de ce festival avaient programmé plusieurs fois les films de Aryan Kaganof.