Enigma is something of a more glamorous version of White Hole, with a wide variety of elaborate textures (often composed of iconographic and religious symbols) converging towards the centre of the screen.
Peter Larsson’s Keyhole Conversation draws the eye down to the small gate of the camera. From there, through quivering and percussive forms of direct and stop-motion animation, the eye begins to experience the scale of an image anew. At times segueing into a flicker, but maintaining a charmed form of attention to the marks of pencils and the channels dredged in emulsion by a paintbrush, all to a curious soundtrack of pulses and bleeps.
Sixteen 'objects', each consisting of one hundred points of light, perform a series of precisely choreographed rhythmic transformations. Accompanied by the sound of a Shakuhachi (the Japanese bamboo flute), the film is an exercise in the visual perception of motion and mathematical structure.
An abstract computer-generated film. The image is of squares revolving in space around and through each other. Colors and forms multiply and divide against a beautiful symphonic score by George Kleinsinger.
Bizarre abstract stop-motion animation questioning traditional values in a period of great social upheaval.
D'art moderne
A film about uncanny valleys and the space between. Painted 16mm film undergoes a monstrous transformation becoming neither analog nor digital.
A unique journey across a topography created entirely from a form of digital light and shadow—a bristling terrain of poles bending the light in every direction. This film is the remake of Barcode, an abstract road-movie about light and shadows.
Three books: a film festival catalogue, a dictionary, the Bible. Three works whose materiality has become obsolete by the digital dematerialization. A commentary on the fragility of culture.
This newly rediscovered short was created in Jim's home studio in Bethesda, MD around 1961. It is one of several experimental shorts inspired by the music of jazz great Chico Hamilton. At the end, in footage probably shot by Jerry Juhl, Jim demonstrates his working method.
The weird hand creatures undergo different transformations in synchrony with the music.
An abstract animated film inspired by the work of jazz musician Chico Hamilton.
"Mouris’s film, YOU’RE NOT REAL PRETTY BUT YOU’RE MINE…, built upon the strongest elements of QUICK DREAM, and added a pop music soundtrack. Mouris says, “I shot another 100 foot roll on classmate Jerry Strawbridge’s home animation stand, and edited that into the best sequences from QUICK DREAM. The whole film was a tongue-in-cheek series of odd couples/couplings, which the title suggested. The FRANK FILM photo collage animation evolved here.” - Yale
A hand moves gently, its presence shifts continuously.
A mathematical play on one repeated movement. It imparts a sense of possibilities: that something simple can produce complex and unexpected patterns. As with an atom, the variety of possibilities from a base movement is potentially infinite.
This is a didactic film in disguise. A progression of brilliant geometric shapes bombard the screen to the insistent beat of drums. The filmmaker programmed a computer to coordinate a highly complex operation involving an electronic beam of light, colour filters and a camera. This animation film, without words, is designed to expose the power of the cinematic medium, and to illustrate the abstract nature of time.
A vibrant animation by Patricia Marx. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2000.
A horse goddess gives birth to three powerful brothers who set out into the Underworld to save three princesses from three evil dragons and reclaim their ancestors' lost kingdom.
In Flesh Flows we see a balance of Beckett’s keen drawing ability, in the probing erotic forms, and his technical acuity, which transforms the carnal images into a compelling, transcendent experience. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with iotaCenter and National Film Preservation Foundation in 2007.
Jane Conger Belson Shimane's first film, Logos, premiered in 1957 and was screened at festivals in North America, Europe, and Latin America. The animated film featured an electronic score by Henry Jacobs. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2001.