Page 70 - Studio International - March April 1975

conceptualizing the maker's previously ignored territories.
problems were impelled by a The film speaks through imagery
whole society's unconscious and its content is investigated as
promptings. The object is related though it carried modern
to financial values and it has little iconographies; we still have rites
justification in an industrial, and the attendant ceremonials
neo-capitalist setting when of death are recorded as though its
currencies are seen to become aesthetics incorporated socially
empty gestural commodities. determined ornamental
Canvases and sculptures are endeavours; and the list of these
certainly not the most readily discoveries is likely to remain
available means of exchange and incomplete until it includes all the
their fictive merits can only be decoratively motivated
calibrated according to a scale phenomena of a society which
which derives its measures from undergoes irrevocable change. It
an idea of luxuries. Pigment and must include design and the
stone are ill-equipped to serve performing arts. It has already
as coins in grocery-shops, at the made laudable attempts to grapple
butcher's or at the baker's and with the linguistics of dance and
Nam June Paik when livelihoods become with the structural complexities
video piece uncertain or when bread itself of modern music, including jazz.
may be scarce, their worth seems These preliminaries should
minute film that Sitney described memory to form the guise of "the
irrelevant. Art, as we have come clarify certain self-contradictions.
as a mixture between Landow and whole"). With such admission,
to know it, is ineluctably A wider and a different
Arakawa, but the usage of words exit the critic.
associated with aristocratic forms dissemination of information are
on "top" of (or next to) images,
6 It has come to my attention of life; it has been the exclusive not necessarily the same thing -
images that infer some sort of
narrativity, ought not to be that the pre-selection jury watched province of the rich and one tends and the two ideals may well find
ten minutes of each film after to take it for granted that this is themselves in conflict;
shrugged off that simply. From
which it could be turned off, the natural condition of creativity nevertheless, both aims cannot
Haslanger's catalogue notes:
unless Ledoux insisted. The - which must be reflected in the do without cheaper outlets if
"If a film is experimental, it must rumour seems highly suspect for a ancillary activities surrounding it.
function itself as an experiment, they are to be redirected towards
jury of worth, but not unheard of, To put it more simply, one is a new readership; both aims must
not as a record, or an analysed
certainly. One would want to inclined to believe that art ignore the suspect claims of
chronology, of a nonfilmic suggest that the whole journals are necessarily expensive,
experiment. Film in the latter wealth. Francois Chevallier was
competitive angle of submission lavishly produced and elitist by the pioneer who introduced the
category are actually historic in
to the festival be eliminated, but inclination. One is also tempted to new journalism into France but
emphasis, yet it is surprising how
then Knokke would become, infer that criticism will perish as he had to accept the support of
many experimental films are
instead of a competition with its outlets are destroyed by rising powerful influences and he
straight record of experiments in
two adequate juries, a choosing paper and printing costs. established `Chroniques de l'Art
other areas (computer graphics,
by one or two 'in the know', Vivant' with the help of the
dramatic narrative, personal It is, nevertheless, difficult to
which means subject to the Maeght Gallery. It is offset
activities) rather than works make predictions. The situation
economic and ideological public produced and resembles the style
exploring how film records what it is still confused but there are some
relations work of a few friends of 'Time Out' to a certain
does and why certain filmic welcome signs of a renewal. Or,
with art magazine connections, extent - although it is a great
information is taken to signify at any rate, signs of a struggle
which would be atrocious. The deal more elegantly conceived
what it does. to circumvent the inevitable. In
way out is a pre-selection jury this context it is impossible to typographically. Chevallier's aims
My interests in Syntax lie in film with an international status as were harshly logical and
language. As with any other competent as the final prize-giving examine what has gone wrong and uncompromising; he wanted
type of language, bits of filmic jury (or as incompetent; no more it is almost equally futile to try to information and comment for an
information are seldom presented no less). It is to be hoped that suggest a way out - but one may intelligent audience. Thus, his
safely assert that contemporary art
in isolation. They modify each another Knokke does take place. has no future unless it acquires editorial principles clashed with
other, interact with the viewer's That one oughtn't to be public attention - and it follows the gallery's - which envisaged the
memory, expectations, precepts," competing for prizes good/better/ from this presupposition that it issues of 'L'Art Vivant' as an
best at an exposition of
Apart from any critique of may have to broaden its appeal, organ of self-publicity, naturally
Haslanger's notion of film experimental film does not alter or it may have to find a new enough. Chevallier's reign did not
language, I feel the film does the fact that without the audience. Most of our recent last long but the pattern he
attempt to present reference of intrusion of competition, Agfa tendencies have sprung from a initiated proved so powerful that
would not give one centime. If
word to image, placement and more or less instinctive realization even his successors failed to
mismatch of word and image, Agfa could be persuaded to give of this predicament and the change it. True, its pages do carry
recurrence of thought pattern the free stock and monies for literature, which describes them, exercises in public relations to
through phrase repetition film-makers' travel and lodging, displays their influence. It is advertise the gallery's own artists
(signifying also recurrence of with no prize giving at all, so neither here, nor there that highly but their role is negligible in
image though no such thing much the better. With such contradictory formulations have comparison with the courageous
occurs as image is continuous) etc. proposal, exit the critic, again • resulted from this situation; an width of the editorial view.
The locus of meaning is Peter Gidal imminent tragedy cannot be Characteristically, Chevallier
investigated, though not in a very resolved at a stroke of the pen. has become a television playwright
heavy manner still in a manner The art of intellection is certainly - and `L'Art Vivant' is no longer
which invites questions as to the not designed to be acceptable to cheap; a copy of it costs 8NF
fixity of conjunction between the masses and its mouth-pieces (around 80p) but a glance at its
represented image and represented will not have a vulgar following; fascinatingly varied pages reveals
meaning (inside or out of the Art Criticism however, they provide the only a truly democratic conception.
film-frame). The film did not way we have to escape from Illustrations broadcast
resolve problems, nor in fact, in France traditional economic definitions. preoccupations with cultural
were they that precisely stated There is an equally welcome phenomena; they eschew a narrow
in two, but the experimental work willingness to take a new look at obsession with gallery-art. In the
on word; image relations in a Part II: The Art Journals our prejudice-riddled critical main the texts are compiled for
filmic context did elaborate very tenets and to revise them in the intelligent and well-educated
specifically the field being Something very strange is light of fresh evidence. It cannot citizens; not for the collector.
investigated, and the work likely to happen in the arts and it be maintained any longer that There is very little lip service to
definitely rehearsed what could be will affect the avant garde very categories and criteria have a bourgeois values and a good deal
very interesting possibilities if directly. The economists of the firm foundation. It is beginning of arid intellectualism which
consequently followed up in western world have overlooked to be obvious that social forces makes an honest attempt to
forthcoming films. A further every glaring signal of the storms- determine the nature and the grapple with themes of
screening at least would have been to-come and it is certainly to the quality of the arts. Consequently, professional ethics. There is no
necessary for adequate writing on credit of the creative spirit that it editors as well as critics have outspoken revolutionary fervour
the film as I admittedly have foresaw a collapse of some kind. begun to enlarge or to modify the in the articles contributed to
forgotten most of its operations It is self-evident at long last that terms of reference. A new `L'Art Vivant' but the social
and remember only "the whole" the struggle against the object and approach is manifest in our conscience is manifest in its stand
(which means bits distended in the movement towards awareness and it investigates against false ideals and its
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