{film} – Page 180 – { feuilleton }

A Picture, a film by Lejf Marcussen

Something wintry for those of us in the northern hemisphere. Danish filmmaker Lejf Marcussen is recognised internationally for his Surrealist animation The Public Voice (1988) but his other films are less well-known. A Picture (1977) is one of the earliest, a 3-minute time-lapse shot of an island in a lake which progresses gradually from winter to summer. Not as resolutely minimal as Fog Line but another example (albeit stretching the definition) of what Andrei Tarkovsky called “sculpting with time”.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Fog Line, a film by Larry Gottheim
• Wavelength
• The Public Voice by Lejf Marcussen

Weekend links 244

MMOB :: Far West (2013) by Alison Scarpulla.

• “…although same-sex love is as old as love itself, the public discourse around it, and the political movement to win rights for it, arose in Germany in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This message may surprise those who believe that gay identity came of age in London and New York, sometime between the Oscar Wilde trials and the Stonewall riots.” Alex Ross reviewing Robert Beachy’s Gay Berlin: Birthplace of a Modern Identity. Beachy talks about his book here.

• “I was in a room with tube synthesizers, where you had to tune them up to play them. It was unbelievable.” John Carpenter talking to Joseph Stannard about composing with electronics. Carpenter’s album of new music, Lost Themes, may be previewed here.

• From 2010: John Ridpath on Mervyn Peake’s illustrations for Lewis Carroll’s Alice Through the Looking Glass and Alice in Wonderland. Related: “The most twisted version of Alice in Wonderland you’ll ever see.”

I was brought up in a world where art was something owned and insured—usually inherited: but seldom if ever made by anyone one I knew.

I had an early inkling that there was fun to be had over the hill, like the feeling when faced with a sunset that someone’s throwing a mega awesome party just beyond the nearest cloud, and I set off to join the caravan. Let’s just say I was in search of company, headed towards the glow, and I found it.

Tilda Swinton‘s speech at the Rothko Chapel

• “Her art often touches on alchemy and magic; and in her memoir of insanity she writes of misreading an Imperial Chemicals sign as ‘chemistry and alchemy’.” Charlotte Higgins on Leonora Carrington.

• Shadows Over Main Street, an anthology of small-town Lovecraftian terror, is out this week from Hazardous Press. 20 stories and poems plus interior illustrations including a contribution of my own.

• “With Fantastic Planet, I felt torn about using it, because it’s…the title of an animated film.” Guitarist Sarah Lipstate, aka Noveller, talks to Ned Raggett about her new album.

• Jim Jupp of Belbury Poly and the Ghost Box record label answers 15 questions.

• A DeLorean driving through a Tron cityscape: Retrowave by Florian Renner.

• Powell & Pressburger’s Tales of Hoffmann (1951) has been restored.

• Music from Forbidden Planet (1956) by Louis & Bebe Barron | The Four Horsemen (1972) by Aphrodite’s Child | Assault on Precinct 13 (Main Theme) (1976) by John Carpenter

Autobahnen

1: Autobahn (1974), an album by Kraftwerk.

Cover art by Emil Schult.

2: Autobahn (1974), a single by Kraftwerk.

3: Doppelalbum (1974), a double-disc compilation album by Kraftwerk.

4: Exceller 8 (1975), a compilation album by Kraftwerk.

Cover by Grafad.

5: Autobahn (1979), an animated film by Roger Mainwood.

6: Autobahn (1980), a compilation album by Kraftwerk.

7: Possessed (1992), an album by the Balanescu Quartet. Track 3: Autobahn.

8: Traffic Jam On Autobahn (1993), a Kraftwerk bootleg from a live soundboard recording at Hummingbird, Birmingham, UK, on July 15th 1991.

9: Autobahn Tour (1998), a Kraftwerk bootleg. The Japanese release of Concert Classics, a live soundboard recording from a concert in Denver, USA on 20th May, 1975.

10: El Baile Alemán (2000), an album by Señor Coconut Y Su Conjunto. Track 6: Autobahn (Cumbia Merengue).

11: Dark Side Of The Autobahn (2003), a single by Mordant Music. The Pink Floyd/Kraftwerk/Joy Division collision that the world was waiting for.

12: Autobahn II (no date) by Kraftwerk. A Russian flexi-disc.

13: Autobahn (2009), an album by Kraftwerk. The remastered release.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The album covers archive

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Ralf and Florian
• Reworking Kraftwerk
• Autobahn animated
• Sleeve craft
• Who designed Vertigo #6360 620?
• Old music and old technology
• Aerodynamik by Kraftwerk

Wildeana 14

BookBench by Trevor Skempton.

Continuing an occasional series. Recent (and not-so-recent) Wildean links.

• The BookBench above is one of several pieces of street furniture placed around London last autumn all of which were based on literary works past and present. Trevor Skempton’s design for Oscar Wilde was based on The Importance of Being Earnest which wouldn’t have been my choice (Dorian Gray, please). See the rest of the designs here.

• “Rare Play About Oscar Wilde Will Return to NYC“: John Gay’s solo play Diversions & Delights will get its first professional New York staging since Vincent Price performed it on Broadway in 1978.

Chapter Three, “Strike a Pose,” concerns Wilde’s visit to the New York studio of the celebrated portrait photographer Napoleon Sarony, where he posed for twenty-seven portraits. The now-familiar images from this session would be used not only for publicity, but also on trade cards advertising “products ranging from cigars to kitchen stoves.” An image of Wilde even wound up promoting “Mme Marie Fontaine’s Bosom Beautifier for Beautifying & Enlarging The Bust.’”

Jennie Rathbun reviews Wilde in America: Oscar Wilde and the Invention of Modern Celebrity by David M. Friedman

• “Letters unravel mystery of the death of Oscar Wilde’s wife: Grandson of Irish dramatist has unearthed medical evidence in private family letters which points to likely cause of death”.

Mme Marie Fontaine’s Bosom Beautifier for Beautifying & Enlarging The Bust. Trade card, 1882.

• Books from Oscar Wilde’s library discovered in the National Library of the Netherlands.

• Wilde-inspired: a list of recommended film viewing.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The Oscar Wilde archive

Number 10: Mirror Animations, a film by Harry Smith

Another Harry Smith film that’s very similar to the one featured here a couple of weeks ago, Number 11, which is also entitled Mirror Animations. Smith wrote a description for this one: “An exposition of Buddhism and the Kaballah in the form of a collage. The final scene shows Agaric mushrooms growing on the moon while the Hero and Heroine row by on a cerebrum.” The copy at YouTube has an improvised score which isn’t very flattering. The film runs for around 4 minutes so I’d suggest finding something of that length from elsewhere. Elastic Dance by African Head Charge works well.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Number 11: Mirror Animations, a film by Harry Smith
• Meeting Harry Smith by Drew Christie
• Heaven and Earth Magic by Harry Smith
• Harry Smith revisited
• The art of Harry Smith, 1923–1991