“Edge of the World” by Mariano Vivanco for Dazed & Confused, model Hilary Rhoda wears Nina Ricci and Armani. I love how surrealist and fleeting this short is…one cannot help being reminded of Maya Deren’s Meshes of the Afternoon.

I’m getting pumped for GENaustin’s Girls Now! conference, which is taking place today at the Ann Richards School. I’m doing two music history workshops with Kristen, along with GRCA alums Izzy and LaRessa and we’re gonna rock. 

I also wanted to remind you that the Austin Asian American Film Festival is still going strong this weekend. AAAFF is showing Persepolis for free tonight at Town Lake. I’ll be at a friend’s birthday party and won’t be able to make it, but hopefully I’ll see you at the JenRo/MenRG show at the Music Gym later tonight. Before swinging by Nomad for Karaoke Underground, of course. And while I won’t be able to attend the first Paradise Titty show at the Creekside Lounge, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t.

Since AAAFF’s got me thinking about independent and/or arthouse cinema, I thought I’d highlight a music video that was clearly inspired by the avant-garde. I present Milla Jovovich’s “The Gentleman Who Fell” music video, which was inspired by Maya Deren’s “Meshes of the Afternoon.” If you have any arthouse-inspired music video suggestions, please share!

Milla Jovovich
“The Gentleman Who Fell”
The Divine Comedy
Directed by Archard/Garner

Inspired by Maya Deren’s “Meshes of the Afternoon”

Hi Everyone… !

I just wanted you to take a look at this piece made my Maya Deren in 1943.  Deren was an American avant-garde filmmaker and film theorist in the 1940-50s. She was also a choregrapher, dance, poet, writer and photographer.

Check out more information about Maya Deren here: MAYA DEREN (WIKI)

Film: Meshes of the Afternoon (13:29)

Meshes of the Afternoon (1943) is a short experimental film directed by wife and husband team, Maya Deren and Alexander Hammid. The film’s narrative is circular, and repeats a number of psychologically symbolic images, including a flower on a long driveway, a key falling, a door unlocked, a knife in a loaf of bread, a mysterious Grim Reaper–like cloaked figure with a mirror for a face, a phone off the hook and an ocean. (More information here: Meshes of the Afternoon (Wiki)

The composer for the film was Teiji Ito, a famous Japanese composer and performer.

Seriously, folks.

Meshes of the Afternoon by Maya Deren:
Part 1

Part 2

Maya Deren

Tomorrow I take off for the City of Angels. Last night I made a short list of everything I wanted to do and see during my two week visit to Los Angeles. Included on the list, next to going to Randy’s Donuts, was to visit the Hollywood Hills area where Maya Deren filmed the famous, Meshes of the Afternoon in 1943. I studied experimental film in college and Maya Deren is considered the mother of the American Avant Gaurd movement. Meshes is of course her most well known work, and confronts deeply entrenched psychological issues through symbolic objects and circular narrative. Deren’s work is  influential because it confronts the human tendency towards repressing issues, and illustrates how, if these issues are not addressed, resolution is impossible and one constantly returns over and over again to the same problem. I love her work because of its cathartic quality, and its simplicity in the film style and production. Point in case,  Deren once said, “I make films for what Hollywood spends on lipstick”. Indeed, Meshes was created for a few hundred dollars in Deren’s Hollywood Hills home, along with her husband Alexander Hammid.

Experimental film may seem completely wacko to most and utterly incomprehensible; yet, I believe that only through dislocating normalcy, can we sift through all the detritus and find sanity.

xoxo

Ariana

Meshes of the Afternoon, 1943

Maya Deren (Estados Unidos,1917-1961)

Película 16 mm, blanco y negro. 14 minutos.

Colecciones: MoMA y Tate Modern.

O cineasta Oskar Fischinger declarou certa feita: “Há apenas um caminho para o artista criativo: produzir somente pelos mais nobres ideais. O verdadeiro artista não deve se importar se é compreendido ou incompreendido. Ele deve ouvir apenas seu espírito criativo e satisfazer seus mais altos ideais, confiando que este será o melhor serviço que ele pode prestar à humanidade”.

Aqui vale a lei empírica de observar o fenômeno para entendê-lo e defini-lo. Por exemplo: neste cinema quais são as preocupações formais e estéticas e quais são suas condições de produção e difusão?

Tal entroncamento de parâmetros é que permite excluir do termo delimitado historicamente como “vanguarda” ou “experimental” cineastas inventivos e revolucionários como Godard ou Straub-Huillet (por se moverem na esfera de produção/exibição do cinema comercial, mesmo que em conflito com seus pressupostos e configurando uma experiência à margem e alternativa). E é o que permite ignorar o videoclipe como contrafação da vanguarda (apesar dos cacoetes de estilo, degradados), pois seu objetivo é comercial (seu outro nome aponta para o caráter promocional, de venda do disco ou da música).

Os filmes experimentais de vanguarda não são feitos para vender, mas pelo prazer de criar, de alargar o repertório apriorístico e de desvendar outros territórios na aventura da percepção (como a poesia).

A unidade básica de sua sintaxe não é mais o plano, mas o fotograma, que sofre toda sorte e azar de intervenções (riscar e pintar a película, colar e sobrepor materiais; manipular o foco e fusões, alterar velocidade e exposição de luz). Eles não querem atingir uma massa imensa de público, mas apenas alguns amigos ou até para satisfazer o próprio realizador. Quem financia são os próprios, com verba de mecenas, fundações e institutos. O circuito de exibição é composto de museus, galerias, cineclubes e universidades.

O trecho citado, do cineasta e pesquisador Carlos Adriano, é da ótima introdução ao  cinema de vanguarda, publicada na Revista Trópico, que é um dos melhores lugares na internet para se ler, entre muitos temas, sobre cinema.

Não é raro o termo vanguarda ser usado para identificar o cinema moderno. Carlo Adriano comenta essa imprecisão, ao mesmo tempo em que oferece um panorama dos filmes, dos manifestos e das recepções que as vertentes vanguardistas tiveram na história do cinema, inclusive no Brasil.

No vídeo, uma das autoras mais importantes dessa seara: Maya Deren, em A study in choreography for camera, de 1945.

Indispensável para pensar o cinema como arte, ou, melhor ainda, como uma forma de expressão afeita ao momento singular em que despontou, na história das artes.

Meshes of the Afternoon (1943)

Meshes of the Afternoon was Maya Deren’s first foray into cinema. Accompanied by Alexander Hammid, Deren, whose real name was Eleanora Derenkowsky, proceeded to revolutionize American avant-garde with a film that to this day reverberates throughout the cinematic spectrum. Meshes of the Afternoon focuses on an unknown woman who finds herself doubling constantly as she continues to return home from an undisclosed location. The film’s score suggests a rhythmic repetition in her life that is always being disrupted by objects finding their way to places by themselves, a hooded man outside her home, the allure of a kitchen knife and the kinetic and gyrating camera. That camera destroys spatio-temporal continuity and plays with the gravity on screen. WWII was occurring, and the volatility of the times along with Deren’s memory of her parents insistence on having a boy find themselves scattered throughout the film’s dreamy and surreal mise-en-scène.

The hooded figure induces a state of paranoia as The Woman can’t seem to catch him or make sense of who he is or what he’s doing. His mirror-for-a-face reflecting The Woman’s deepest fears back to her. Naturally, he turns out to be The Woman’s lover. Even after he’s unveiled, The Woman seems no more comfortable than before. She nervously looks on as he is revealed to have been a major part of the occurrences that afternoon. His influence has clearly penetrated her subconscious. She needs to destroy this elusive image of her lover to return back to reality. After she destroys him, mirror and all, she ends up dead as a consequence. Having only killed the elusive image, her lover returns to find her dead, covered in glass.

Witch’s Cradle (1944)

Witch’s Cradle is an unfinished collaborati0n between Deren and Marcel Duchamp. Due to its incomplete status, the film has several cuts to blank footage interspersed throughout, which then cut back to more footage of the film. Luckily, what remains is terrific in its own right. The film positions black vs. white in a sort of battle of the sexes. White and black string find themselves choking, caressing and being manipulated by the likes of the opposite sex. White being female, black being male. The film continues Deren’s trademark spatially destructive camera techniques and strange bits of rhythm. It’s hard to speak too in-depth about a lot of the film as it seems too fragmented to make much of it in terms of narrative. A Woman is filmed from various angles with a painted symbol on her forehead, a man is seen manipulating a piece of white string between his fingers, what appears to be the outside of a tent is filmed showing a white thread throughout a dark environment. The witchcraft symbols and the manipulation of the string seem to be representing the seemingly incomprehensible process of the relationship. My lack of a grasp on the film be damned, it’s a wonderful experience.

At Land (1944)

At Land, Deren’s 2nd completed film, sees Deren starring once again as a nameless woman who finds herself washed ashore on an island. Following her arrival, the waves are seen reeling backward, breaking their tradition. The nameless woman climbs up a dead tree trunk, only to magically appear on the table at a dinner party. The woman is out of her natural habitat as she’s been doubled already and is seen both walking through the woods and crawling across the table as the guests ignore her completely, no doubt signifying their myopia. At the end of the table, a chess game is in progress. A white pawn is knocked off the board and finds itself tumbling down rocks and finally into the ocean. Following her search, we see her grasp at rocks and land seemingly for the sake of her life. The film continues the black(male) vs. white(female) struggle, shown in the chess board as well as in the garb of the extra characters. The woman follows a man into a house where another man is entrenched in a white sheet. They stare at each other until she finally decides to leave.

As she scours the beach, it’s apparent she’s been changed. Though she’s back where she “belongs”, she is uneasy. She soon discovers 2 women playing chess on the beach, dressed in black, one with expensive jewelry. She earns their trust, only to steal the white pawn and run off as we discover she’s been doubled several times throughout. We then watch as she walks off into the distance. The film displays Deren against the world. She’s ignored among the bourgeois and constantly searching amidst the land.

A Study in Choreography for the Camera (1945)

A Study in Choreography for the Camera is a very short, but very interesting work. Deren adored dancing, and this film shows dancing as a transcendent action linking disparate worlds together via the graceful moves of Talley Beattey. Deren wrote, “The movement of the dancer creates a geography that never was. With a turn of the foot, he makes neighbors of distant places.” We first witness Deren rotate the camera beyond 360 degress, witnessing Beattey’s movements in each passing segment, finally happening upon his face rather close to the camera. He then stretches a foot out and proceeds to dance his way across various places, jumping from one to the other with no travel in between. The 2 mins end with Beattey spinning faster and faster in front of a statue until he seems to develop another face or two. Despite its length, A Study in Choreography for the Camera is a poignant work speaking of Deren’s fascination with dance and its ability to cross cultural divides.

Ritual in Transfigured Time (1946)

Ritual in Transfigured Time silently follows a foreign woman as she stumbles upon Maya Deren performing the menial task of unwinding wool from a loom. The woman then proceeds to unwind the wool, unsurprisingly black, from her arms. Another woman, seeming to come from the party occurring next door, brings with her the literal winds of change as she intrudes into Deren’s domestic space. Once the wool has been fully unwound, Deren’s character disappears, her role fulfilled. The foreign woman then finds herself among the people next door, all of them performing strange, dance-like longings taking the place of typical social interaction. The repetition first seen in the unwinding of the wool then begins to penetrate the party. Once the party stops, the ritual of social interaction takes place outside entirely in slow motion. We’ve now learned the foreign woman is a proxy of sorts for Deren’s character.

Once she tires of the ritual, she seeks freedom in the loving arms of water that release her from the shackles of tedium, her white dress accentuated by the film’s switch to only black and white shades as she is filmed underwater. Throughout the film are full stops allowing you to focus on the movements of certain characters as they dance their way around. It all almost feels like a performance. Perhaps that’s the point. It’s a fascinating take on social interaction and the woman oppressed by the “role” she plays.

Meditation on Violence (1948)

Meditation on Violence is Deren’s least interesting film up to this point, but it’s certainly not without its fair share of merit and its place among Deren’s oeuvre. The film is a collaboration with Wu Tang master, Chao Li Chi. We watch as he performs in 3 acts, 2 of which he is shirtless performing in front of a white backdrop, a black backdrop and the corner that both colors meet. Deren’s camera is fascinated by the implied violence of the movements and blurs the line between beauty and violence. To my surprise, I read that she reversed some of the footage creating a loop. The difference is imperceptible.

The Very Eye of Night (1958)

The Very Eye of Night, Deren’s final completed film, was her most controversial and poorly received. This is likely due to out of control expectations. The film experienced a lot of productions problems as well. Deren paints negative images of dancers from the Metropolitan Opera Ballet School  onto a star-ridden night sky backdrop. They float freely through the space, dancing and moving as if like constellations or gods. Deren had returned to the theme of transcendence through dance. The men and women are both white figures, sometimes laced with black fabric, dancing harmoniously in unison. It could be said this is Deren’s only truly positive film. Though A Study in Choreography for the Camera spoke of the same subject, it was a more ambiguous picture. The Very Eye of Night seems to suggest a possible reconciliation between male and female. The space setting could be read as a bitter contrast, though, which furthers complicates the issue. This certainly feels like the culmination of her work, even if it’s not quite as good as her earlier work and certainly less experimental.

I’ve deliberately left out her work on Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti as she had merely shot the footage and was unable to do any sort of editing or finalizing before she died in 1961, at the age of 44. The footage was spliced together by Teiji Ito and his wife in 1985, but many argue it goes against her original concept for the film. The consensus on her death seems to be that she died of a cerebral hemorrhage due to both malnutrition and an addiction to amphetamines and sleeping pills, though Stan Brakhage wrote that she likely died as a result of her involvement with the Haitian Voodoo rituals. Her ashes were scattered by her third husband, Teiji Ito, on Mount Fuji. Ito saw it fit to scatter her ashes there considering her love for ritual, dance, voodoo, music, poetry, writing and, of course, experimental film. No doubt her legacy will live on as a pioneering feminist film-maker. David Lynch will see to that.

El mundo del cine es fanático de las listas. Todos pueden opinar. Todas las listas son válidas. Y todo tiene cabida en este juego. Hasta la muerte juega un rol esencial. El pasado mes de junio la revista neoyorquina Film Comment seleccionó los que, a su criterio, son los 40 mejores directores que tuvieron la poca fortuna de morir antes de llegar (o apenas llegados) a los 50 años; edad límite entre la madurez y la vejez. Una lista con varios nombres que nosotros, cinéfilos del tercer mundo, no hemos tenido la fortuna de ver siquiera asomarse en nuestras salas.

La lista completa con una breve reseña de cada uno y la edad que tenían al morir tras el salto.

1. F.W. Murnau (42)

Uno de los pilares del expresionismo alemán de los años 20; creador de películas como Nosferatu, Fausto, Amanecer y Tabú, murió en un accidente automovilístico en 1931. El conductor del auto era su chofer, empleado y amante filipino de 14 años García Stevenson, quien tampoco sobrevivió al accidente.

2. Jean Vigo (29)

Uno de los creadores más puros y personales de la historia del cine mundial. Director de Cero en conducta y L’Atalante, murió de tuberculosis en 1934.

3. Sergei Eisenstein (50)

El gran director de cine ruso, creador de clásicos como El acorazado Potemkin o Iván el terrible, murió cuando preparaba la tercera parte de la saga sobre dicho zar a consecuencia de un ataque cardiaco.

4. R.W. Fassbinder (36)

Para dar una idea de su desmesura y creatividad basta decir que realizó 41 películas en 13 años, incluyendo la monumental Berlin Alexanderplatz. Desmesurada como su vida fue su muerte por una sobredosis de cocaína y píldoras para dormir en 1982.

5. Maya Deren (44)

Actriz, editora, guionista y directora de sus propias películas; fue también bailarina, coreógrafa, poeta y pintora. Murió en 1961 de un derrame cerebral causado por una desnutrición avanzada; condición agravada por el abuso de anfetaminas.

6. Jean Eustache (42)

El notable creador francés dejó una obra mínima en la que destaca la extraordinaria La madre y la puta, presentada con gran escándalo en Cannes 73 y que es quizá el mejor film francés de dicha década. Se suicidó en 1981 tras un accidente que lo dejó parcialmente inmovilizado.

7. Ritwik Ghatak (50)

Conforma (junto a Satyajit Ray y Mrinal Sen) la  gran trilogía del cine clásico de la India; aunque en la actualidad esté casi olvidado. Murió en 1976, tras años de mala salud y alcoholismo.

8. Humphrey Jennings (43)

Documentalista inglés. Murió en 1950 en la isla de Poros, Grecia al al caer de una colina mientras buscaba locaciones para un documental sobre los servicios de salud en la post-guerra europea.

9. Glauber Rocha (42)

Uno de los más notables directores del cine brasilero y americano; director de obras cumbres como Dios y el diablo en la tierra del sol y Antonio das Mortes murió en 1981 de un ataque cardíaco, consecuencia de un cáncer pulmonar.

10.  Hollis Frampton (48)

Pionero (junto a Stan Brackage) del arte digital y de la expresión abstracta en el cine americano, murió de cáncer en 1984.

11.  Barbara Loden (48)

La esposa de Elia Kazan, fue la directora del film independiente Wanda, presentado en Cannes 71. Murió de cáncer al seno en 1980.

12.  Larisa Sheptiko (41)

Directora rusa, murió en un accidente automovilístico con 4 miembros de su equipo durante el rodaje de Adiós a Matyora.

13.  Andrzej Munk (40)

Director de cine polaco, murió en un accidente automovilístico regresando del campo de concentración de Auschwitz, donde se encontraba rodando su film: Pasajero en 1961.

14.  Paul Sharits (50)

Director de cine experimental, parte del denominado “Movimiento Estructuralista”, murió en 1993.

15.  Thomas H. Ince (42)

Uno de los grandes pioneros del cine; su muerte continúa siendo un enigma sin aclarar, y uno de los grandes escándalos del naciente Hollywood. Murió a bordo del yate “Oneida” de propiedad del magnate William Randolph Hearst, probablemente asesinado por éste en 1924.

16.  Yilmaz Güney (47)

Director (junto a Serif Goren) de la aclamada Yol (Palma de Oro en Cannes 82) muró de cáncer gástrico en 1984.

17.  Seth Holt (48)

Director de películas de terror de la Hammer, murió de un ataque cardiaco en 1971.

18.  Fabián Bielinsky (47)

El director de Nueve reinas y El aura murió de un ataque cardíaco en 2006.

19.  Ron Rice (29)

Director de cine experimental, murió de neumonía en 1964.

20.  Michael Reeves (26)

Muerte por sobredosis de barbitúricos probablemente debida a depresión en 1969.

21.  Marlon Riggs (37)

Poeta, director y activista por los derechos de los homosexuales, Riggs murió de SIDA en 1994.

22.  Theo van Gogh (47)

El sobrino-bisnieto de Vincent Van Gogh, fue asesinado por un extremista islámico, tras la difusión de su película Sumisión en la televisión holandesa; considerada blasfema por los musulmanes en 2004.

23.  Shuji Teryama (47)

Escritor y director de cine y teatro de vanguardia, considerado como uno de los artistas más productivos y provocativos de la historia de Japón. Murió de cirrosis en 1983.

24.  Warren Sonbert (47)

Cineasta experimental. Murió de complicaciones referidas al SIDA en 1995.

25.  Cristian Nemescu (27)

Cineasta rumano. Murió junto al sonidista Andrei Toncu en un accidente automovilístico, al ser embestidos por un chofer que se pasó una luz roja. Su última película fue premiada en Cannes.

26.  Barbara Rubin (35)

Involucrada con Andy Warhol, y Velvet Underground, dirigió una sola película considerada uno de los primeros ejercicios de arte multimedia: “Concks and cunts” (1963) Murió de una infección postparto en 1980 a los 35 años.

27.  Cyril Collard (36)

Director francés de “las noches salvajes”. Murió de SIDA en 1992.

28.  Forough Farrokhzad (32)

Poetisa iraní que dirigió una sola película: un documental de 22 minutos llamado La casa es negra. Murió en 1967 en un accidente automovilístico.

29.  Fei Mu (45)

Este casi olvidado director chino, director de Primavera en un pueblo pequeño murió en 1951, exiliado en Hong Kong tras la revolución comunista en China.

30.  Marjorie Keller (43)

La directora de notables trabajos experimentales independientes murió en 1994.

31.  Juan Pablo Rebella (32)

El director de 25 watts y Whisky se suicidó en 2006 de un disparo en la sien.

32.  Vasili Shukshin (45)

Hallado muerto en 1974 a bordo del crucero “Dunai” en el río Volga, tras denunciar sus sospechas de intentos de asesinato en su contra por las autoridades rusas. Las circunstancias de su muerte continúan siendo un misterio hasta hoy.

33.  Kent MacKenzie (50)

Documentalista inglés, director de “Los exiliados”, sobre jóvenes indios estadounidenses que dejan las reservas a las que han sido confinados por el gobierno para vivir libres en Los Ángeles. Murió en 1980.

34.  James Blue (49)

Cineasta graduado del IDHEC, fue nominado al Óscar a mejor documental por su trabajo Unos apuntes sobre el problema alimenticio. Murió en 1980.

35.  Antonio Pietrangeli (49)

Director italiano. Murió en 1968.

36.  Werner Hochbaum (47)

Director de cine alemán. Murió en 1946.

37.  Artie Mitchell (45)

Uno de los directores de Tras la puerta verde (considerada El ciudadano Kane del porno) fue asesinado por su hermano y co-director en 1991.

38.  D’Urville Martin (45)

Nacido en 1939, Martin fue una figura destacada en varias películas setenteras de blaxploitation. Dirigió dos películas pero su estilo de vida desenfrenado lo llevó a la muerte de un ataque cardiaco en 1984.

39.  Michel Bena (41)

Con solo 2 películas en su haber murió de SIDA en 1991.

40.  Kenneth Hawks (31)

El hermano de Howard Hawks, murió en un accidente de aviación durante el rodaje de la que sería su última película: Such men are dangerous en 1930, junto a otros 10 miembros del equipo de producción.

This short film from 1946 showcases Maya Deren’s amazing cinematography which added surrealist elements to the relatively new medium of art films at the time. Ritual In Transfigured Time was originally silent, but for me the film seems to be somewhat enhanced by the synchronization of the Kraftwerk song below. Enjoy.

Mp3: Kraftwerk – Ananas Symphonie

Note: Start the song when the first shot appears, about 21 seconds in.

A relaxing evening with experimental film. While studying film history in my undergraduate days, one of the works that most impressed me was the short film ‘Meshes of the Afternoon’ by Maya Deren and Alexander Hammid. Created in 1943, it explores a repetitive, fractured narrative filled with symbolic images that invite a psychoanalytic reading. I love returning to it every so often, and thinking each time how the music by Teiji Ito is the perfect complement.

And no, this post will not be about the sub-teen genre films like Save the Last Dance or Take the Lead.

In addition to people making films of their pets, gardens, and salvia trips, I’ve been noticing more people with backgrounds in dance making short dance films.  With the availability of digital technology, so many artists who would be stranded within their respective disciplines are able to extend their art.  And dance seems particularly suited to film, though it’s never really been explored effectively.  Sure, there was Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire, but the films themselves were only about showcasing their talent; the methodology of the dance never really affected the cinematography or, perhaps more importantly, the editing.

The dance films I’m seeing more often on Vimeo and other web hosting sites share more in common with Leni Riefenstahl (dancer turned filmmaker) and, more particularly, Maya Deren (aspiring dancer, choreographer, and filmmaker).  Both women were fascinated by dance and this was reflected in their work, in their understanding of the human body, cinematography, and editing.

Here are some examples of some of the newer dance inspired filmmaking: