Shibuya Vernacular

Prelude 14 begins in deep brilliant red which darkens into deeper reds and lavender shapes, disrupted by a variety of colors settling into browns and grays and shapes most rock-like, all of which is then shot-thru with sufficient yellow to break up all hard-edge form and give a molten aspect to the mixtures of shapes.

16 mm, color, 3:35 or 10 min. Study for No. 11. "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."

An abstract experimental short film from Jordan Belson.

Short film by Mary Ellen Bute

From 1967-71 Barry Spinello made films without camera or tape recorder by hand drawing both sound and picture directly onto clear 16mm leader. His interest and education (at Columbia) was in music, painting, and poetry. His effort was to merge these three: “to squeeze sound and picture out of the same tube – to weave a cloth with warp as sound, woof as picture, and meaning the fabric itself."

A stop-motion animation compiled of postcards, photographs and video shot on the Spanish island of Mallorca. This unique island has a long and complex history of natural and human evolution, and is remarkable for its blend of rustic farmland, chic resorts, and grimy low-budget tourism - heavily dependent on British and German vacationers. This work represents the island through the centuries, chronicling its changes and equally temporary visitations. These changes include the impact of mass tourism and natural alterations, such as the common brush fires and the invasive Asian Palm Weevil that has been decimating the palms— icons of beach vacations.

A whirlwind of improvisation combines the images of animator Pierre Hébert with the avant-garde sound of techno whiz Bob Ostertag in this singular multimedia experience, a hybrid of live animation and performance art.

One room, two half bodies, a silent relationship.

In the 1920s, Man Ray directed four films which, although largely unknown by the general public, made him into a major figure in avant-garde cinema. His films were to be as radical as his images or objects. Included: Le Retour à la Raison, Les Mystères du Château du Dé, Emak-Bakia, L'étoile de Mer and collected shorts.

Around the sleeping bodies, some presences occupy the architecture and move around the space in obscure activities: nothing of their actions is visible to us, except in the fragments in which the image shows itself under the flashlight. Monelle is a circular film without any narrative or hierarchy, without a beginning or an end, and it circumscribes a place of promiscuity and ambiguity between the different formats used—35mm and CGI animation—and the approaches of two opposites film attitudes—the structural cinema and the horror genre.

The poet's dreams a maiden's bubbles through edifices of forest and eclectic contagion.

The scene is set in front of a French chateau. The camera chases improbable incidents across the screen. Many are constructed out of one of Jordan's favorite engravings illustrators: Poyet. Duels occur on a tight rope. Heavier-than- air machines fly (and sometimes crash). Below guns spear exploding spheres. The timing of the animation is exquisite, existing in an atmosphere balanced between frenzy and delight.

Animation, also of a new order in the recent series of short works. Mostly on black space, the figures in blue perform a very compact and jewel-like opera in surreal form, again to Satie’s piano music. Ideally, the film should be projected on a 30" wide white card sitting on a music stand, center stage of a large auditorium or music hall, with sound from the projector piped into the big speaker system. The film is most effective this way, but can be shown normal-size also

Music by Dick Connette from his album, Too Sad for the Public Vol. 1: Oysters Ice Cream Lemonade. Suzzy Roche sings the vocal. Dick’s lyrics were inspired by the reknowned photography book, Wisconsin Death Trip.

A short film spelling Tokyo in hiragana.

Seele orders an all-out attack on NERV, aiming to destroy the Evas before Gendo can trigger Third Impact and Instrumentality under his control.

In an urban Indian city, A struggling actor battles for his career, but his friend who loses money in a scam deal commits an action that puts both of their lives in danger. The three last days before the incident follows the struggling actor, an ambitious filmmaker, a wannabe hustler, an opportunist, a lover and two cinephile thugs, through an inter-twining vignette of their lives.

A girl who was floating freely in the water accidentally gets her skin cut by a sailboat passing by. The story is derived from personal experience, recreating the senses of women in love and the unique inner sense of time through creation.

A lucid dream turned nightmarish reality. A ship sinking into a world of fear. A short film that’s mostly puppetry by one of America's most prolific twentieth century artists.

The walls of video rental shops in Japan are lined with hundreds upon hundreds of animation DVDs, but experimental and art animation on DVD are rare. To remedy this situation, Image Forum put together this showcase of the work of contemporary avant-garde animators trained in Kyoto and Tokyo.