184, 517-518 by Brakhage: An Anthology (Volumes One and Two)

[Gordon]

I have had it on my wish list for a while, along with In the Mirror of Maya Deren. There don't seem to be any critical reviews of the film on the web, but I will probably order it soon, regardless.

Incidentally, it is much cheaper - $17.14 - at DVD Pacific: http://www.dvdpacific.com/item.asp?ID=602263

[DDillaman]

I saw it theatrically several years ago. I know Fred Camper takes umbrage with it (go to his site for details), but I thought it was pretty good and certainly had lots of nice bits of Brakhage speaking his mind. I can't say I remember it in much detail to go beyond that. I have to say the main reason I'd want to revisit it would be for the excerpts of films that didn't make the BY BRAKHAGE set, particularly the ... (ELLIPSIS) excerpt, which was breathtaking. I am desperate to see those films. I've seriously considered arranging a retrospective screening just to make it happen.

[Arn777]

From Sonic Youth dot com:

SYR 6 AVAILABLE DECEMBER 6
'Koncertas Stan Brakhage Prisiminimui', the sixth album in the band's Sonic Youth Recordings series, will be released on December 6 of this year. This CD edition of the SYR series is a recording of the benefit concert held at and for The Anthology Film Archives on April 12, 2003. Sonic Youth performed with drummer/percussionist Tim Barnes. Part of the proceeds of this CD will again benefit the Anthology Film Archives. More info on this upcoming release can be found here.

[zedz]

From Sonic Youth dot com:

SYR 6 AVAILABLE DECEMBER 6
'Koncertas Stan Brakhage Prisiminimui', the sixth album in the band's Sonic Youth Recordings series, will be released on December 6 of this year. This CD edition of the SYR series is a recording of the benefit concert held at and for The Anthology Film Archives on April 12, 2003. Sonic Youth performed with drummer/percussionist Tim Barnes. Part of the proceeds of this CD will again benefit the Anthology Film Archives. More info on this upcoming release can be found here.

Good on Sonic Youth for supporting Anthology, but does anybody else find the notion of performing accompaniment for these films obnoxious? Brakhage could not have been more explicit about his desire that his silent films be projected truly silent: it was an integral part of his aesthetic.

[Gregory]

There was a controversy over that a couple of years ago. The Frameworks archive has some interesting exchanges on it, including a statement from Anthology Film Archives and several comments from Marilyn Brakhage.
Although they have not strictly adhered to Stan's preferences about how his work is shown, Sonic Youth at least have been far more thoughtful and consciencious about this kind of thing than other bands (such as Stereolab) who routinely project all manner of avant-garde film in atrocious ways (and without permission) merely as "background," it seems, to add interest to the look of their live performance and/or to enhance their connection to a certain kind of creative lineage. I enjoy Stereolab's music quite a bit, but their very casual use of video is something about them I don't really like.

[leo goldsmith]

It also helps that they were performing at a benefit for Brakhage and his family. And also that they're Sonic Youth and among the coolest people ever.

[blindside8zao]

Though I am aware of Sonic Youth I am not particularly aware of their music aside from hearing a few songs, and am certainly not aware of how they used brakhage's films.

I can say though, that in a lot of my art, I use a collage style. I believe much of art is simply taking pre-existing notions and ideas and fusing them together. Art, at its most basic level is simply an amalgamation of materials, for example, different colored paints. In a similar way, the ideas presented in "original" art are collections of ideas and concepts that previously existed. This is similar to the idea of a writer that writes by taking ideas he has gotten from reading other narratives and changing them slightly and combining them with aspects of other narratives.

Some art that I have done explores this. I take the art of others and collage it together to bring to attention previsouly unconsidered relationships between the works of art that can have interesting cultural implications. This is done in a way to create a new piece of art, even though it is only a collection of other's art, it is using art as materials instead of say, paint, or something like that. The result is a different kind of art than any one of it's single parts. One might call me presumptious but I am willing to stop and admit that my art as a whole is usually not any better than any of its parts, only different.

So, I am not sure if Sonic Youth are performing under the idea of strengthening Brakhage's work by playing their music to it (maybe they think they are reinforcing the rhythm?) or perhaps providing something fun to help people not to get "bored", I don't know.

If they are taking the work and using it in conjunction with their music to create a new work of art, then things are a bit different.
The line between profaning good art and creating new, here, is thin. Eliot's The Wasteland often uses numerous references and meanings from other works of literature and it compares and juxtaposes them to create something new. This is what I'm talking about. However, no one questions his use of this material now, because he is a proven artist. Did they when he first wrote it? I don't know.

My point is, there are ways to create new art using old art. But if Sonic Flood is exhibiting Brakhage's films and playing their music to it, that would seem wrong to me. If they are calling it something new though, and not entirely Brakhage, that's different.

[milkcan]

Does anyone know the frame rates for Rage Net and Lovesong? Or can someone point me in the direction of the answer?

[Gregory]

Do you mean Brakhage's preferred projection speed for those films, or what speed Criterion used to make the transfer for DVDs? I don't believe the man had fixed, unchanging preferences for the speed of most of his films, including those. Either 18 or 24 fps would be OK for those; the projectionist has some leeway.

[milkcan]

I've only seen them on Criterion's DVD. I ask this because often the film Lovesong will run smoothly and then at times it will go fast (this may also have to do with how much paint/different colors are on the frames) to convey motion, energy, emotion.

[In Heaven]

So, last night a little art museum had a screening of several Brakhage films (as well as one by a filmmaker named Jim Davis I can't even find a imdb page for,) the most impressive of which was "The Text of Light," a 71-minute dazzaling array of refracted light from a glass ashtray. No shot was longer than half a second to a second, for the entire time, and all the shows had dazzaling arrays of light from the prisms formed in the glass. It was absolutley incredible, and althought I had seen some Brahkage in the past (only the Criterion dvd,) I'm now rather in love. Can I get book reccomendations? Or is there any chance that Criterion will be relasing more Brakhage?

[Gregory]

Sorry to repeat something I wrote in another thread, but to answer the question about more Brakhage in the collection: From Marilyn Brakhage's comments it seems that she, Camper and Criterion were all pleased with the results of the first collection and all are interested in putting out a second volume -- the only question is when they'll find the time to do all the extensive work that such a project would entail. If it doesn't work out with Criterion, Marilyn Brakhage will likely pursue other avenues, wherever they exist. Stan worked on the first DVD set because he wanted more people to be able to see his work (although many involved felt that allowing people to see digital transfers of the films on their TVs, computers, or home projectors was something of a compromise). Marilyn intends to carry on those wishes both through DVD releases (private) and film rentals (public). Personally, I am not extremely impatient about another Brakhage DVD simply because I think it would be optimal to wait until a new format becomes viable so as to reduce compression, with results far superior to by Brakhage.
In the meantime, my advice is to try and attend screenings of the films whenever possible. I am not as much of a purist as Camper, who says that one hasn't really seen a film and is not fully qualified to write about it if one has only seen it on a home video release; one has only seen a film if one has seen it projected on celluloid. Nevertheless, I believe that in the case of Brakhage (so far) there is simply no real substitute for the films themselves. Enjoy!

[benm]

4 of brakhage's last films are being shown on film at the presentation house gallery in north vancouver until the 9th of april. marilyn brakhage spoke yesterday and mentioned again that criterion is interested in putting out a second collection of brakhage's work.

she also confirmed that stan of south park is indeed named after stan brakhage. matt parker and trey stone flimed a student film at CU and brakhage is in it.

another interesting thing about brakhage is that one of his films was painted on IMAX film. it has never been shown at an imax screen but that would be quite the treat if it were.

[barnyard078]

Just in case you're curious, that student film is Cannibal: the Musical. Watch for him near the beginning of the film, as the expedition prepares to set out. If you still miss him, they point him out in the hilarious (and drunken) cast commentary. If you do not own Cannibal: the Musical, please do so. For Stan.

[Toxicologist]

A seemingly interesting Stan Brakhage release due out in October

[Noiretirc]

Oh I just watched DogStarMan and I thought it was so beautiful and honest. This cannot be 61-64. No, I don't believe it. Please point me in the direction of his influencers/mentors/inspirators/co-conspirators. (Eisenstein notwithstanding.) This jolted and astounded me, and I'm presently dizzy. (But you probably knew that.) It's extremely narrative, innit? Must I see The Art Of Vision, CriOrgs? Is it DogStarMan uncut, whereby he makes it to the top, sells lumber, and eventually goes into Real Estate, or some other thing?

I will now see with my own eyes..........

[Gregory]

This page has links to a whole slew of resources

[Noiretirc]

This page has links to a whole slew of resources

Gregory, I Love You. The Act Of Seeing With One's Own Eyes was the quickest 31min50sec I ever experienced. I've run 10km faster than that. I wasn't shocked or horrified with this film. Rather, I was grounded/reminded, by the pure, absolute, honest and uncompromising nature of this piece, that on our deathbeds (if we are lucky enough), only relationships and experiences will matter. Things and Stuff that we have bought or mortgaged or collected will not matter. We are all the same in bed, or on the autopsy table. Those scalpel wielding geeks will snicker at the latest Bushisms or Obamaisms blaring on the news radio as they check your chemistry. The Queen must wipe her arse (or have it wiped). But who will attend your funeral, and what will they say? The colours were sumptuous, 16mm be damned. What's your 10k time?

[zedz]

Must I see The Art Of Vision, CriOrgs? Is it DogStarMan uncut, whereby he makes it to the top, sells lumber, and eventually goes into Real Estate, or some other thing?

It's more like Dog Star Man de- and re-constructed. I believe it's all of the material in the parent film presented in isolation and in every possible combination of its double and multiple superimpositions (which is why it's over 4 hours long), but I don't think it includes any footage that isn't already in Dog Star Man.

[swo17]

You'll get roughly the same effect by staring deeply into zedz's avatar and hitting yourself in the head repeatedly with a hammer.

[zedz]

You'll get roughly the same effect by staring deeply into zedz's avatar and hitting yourself in the head repeatedly with a hammer.

for four and a half hours

[Noiretirc]

You'll get roughly the same effect by staring deeply into zedz's avatar and hitting yourself in the head repeatedly with a hammer.

People have often told me similar things about Merzbow. And I love Merzbow. =P~

Thanks for the info, good people. I really hope that Criterion does more Brakhage. Desistfilm and Wedlock House also shook me. I viewed them alone, in the dark, face near screen, and this was before I checked the very excellent Camper essay!

Disc 2.....

[Adam]

There will be. We hosted Marilyn Brakhage at Filmforum last Sunday, and she confirmed that they are working on a new Criterion with 29 more films (!).
Actually, she is in Los Angeles this week working with the Academy Film Archive on the telecine.

The seven that we screened are among the 29:

Brakhage with Brakhage - Marilyn Brakhage introducing Films by Stan Brakhage

The Machine of Eden (1970, 16 mm, silent, 11 min)
The Machine (of Eden) operates via “spots” - from sun’s disks (of the camera lens) thru emulsion grains (within which, each, a universe might be found) and snow’s flakes (echoing technical aberrations on film’s surface) blots (upon the lens itself) and the circles of sun and moon, etcetera; these “mis-takes” give birth of “shape” (which, in this work, is “matter” subject and otherwise) amidst a weave of thought: (I add these technicalities, here, to help viewers defeat the habits of classical symbolism so that this work may be immediately seen, in its own light): the “dream” of Eden will speak for itself.

“He was born, he suffered, he died” (1974, 16 mm, silent, 7 min)
The quote is Joseph Conrad answering a critic who found his books too long. Conrad replied that he could write a novel on the inside of a match-book cover, thus (as above), but that he “preferred to elaborate.” The “Life” of the film is scratched on black leader. The “elaboration” of color tonalities is as the mind’s eye responds to hieroglyph.

Burial Path (1978, 16mm, color/silent, 15min (18fps))
The film begins with the image of a dead bird. The mind moves to forget, as well as to remember: this film, in the tradition of Thot-Fal’n, graphs the process of forgetfulness against all oddities of remembered bird-shape. The film might best be seen along with Sirius Remembered and The Dead as the third part of a trilogy.

Visions in Meditation #4 (1990, 16 mm, silent, 19 min)
I’ve made three pilgrimages in my life: the 40-some-year home of Sigmund Freud in Vienna, Emily Dickinson’s in Amherst, and the mountain ranch and crypt, would you call it?, of D.H. Lawrence, outside Taos. I keep returning to the Lawrence environs again and again; and this last time attempted photography in that narrow little building where his ashes were (or were not) deposited (contradictory stories about that). There is a child-like sculpture of The Phoenix at the far end of the room, a perfectly lovely emblem to deflate any pomposity people have added to Lawrence’s “I rise in flames ….” The building is open, contains only a straw chair (remindful of the one Van Gogh painted) and a broom, which I always use with delight to sweep the dust and leaves from this simple abode. I have tried to make a film as true to the spirit of Lawrence as is this gentle chapel in homage of him. I have attempted to leave each image within the film free to be itself and only obliquely in the service of Lawrence’s memory. I have wanted to make it a film within which that child-Phoenix can reasonably nest. – S.B.

Boulder Blues and Pearls and… (1992, 16 mm, Sound by Rick Corrigan, 23 min)
Music by Rick Corrigan.
Peripheral envisionment of daily life as the mind has it - i.e., a terrifying ecstasy of (hand-painted) synapting nerve ends back-firing from thought’s grip of life.

Persians 1-3 (1999, 16 mm, silent, 8 min)
Persian Series #1: This hand-painted and elaborately step-printed work begins with a flourish of reds and yellows and purples in palpable fruit-like shapes intersperced by darkness, then becomes lit lightning-like by sharp multiply-colored twigs-of shape, all resolving into shapes of decay.

Persian Series #2: Multiple thrusts and then retractions of oranges, reds, blues, and the flickering, almost black, textural dissolves suggesting an amalgam approaching script.

Persian Series #3: Dark, fast-paced symmetry in mixed weave of tones moving from oranges & yellows to blue-greens, then retreating (dissolves of zooming away) to both rounded and soft-edged shapes shot with black.

Chinese Series (2003, 35mm, silent, 2 min)
“Stan Brakhage had been planning a film inspired by Chinese ideograms for years; he made his unfinished Chinese Series in his dying months, scratching its marks on black 35-mm film. In its two haunting minutes, exploding lines flirt with the depiction of recognizable objects.” – Fred Camper, from the Chicago Reader, September 12, 2003.

[Noiretirc]

This is fabulous news and info, Adam. Thank you.

[mteller]

Hallelujah! I remember the Persian series from a Brakhage retrospective a few years ago, they're excellent. Hopefully this new collection will be on Blu-Ray (with a Blu-Ray release of the first collection too).