In Visual Variations on Noguchi (1945), the camera browses over the surface of Noguchi's wooden sculptures; it zooms in as if trying to touch their surface. At times it surprises the spectator by coming from within the structures whilst occasionally adopting an almost voyeuristic position, looking at the desired object from behind surrounding structures. These are a few aspects that grant this work's imagery a haptic dimension. We can certainly feel Menken's experience of Noguchi's works through the closeness of the camera to the sculptures and the texture this adds to the already textured wooden surfaces. What's more, through the camera moving up and down, in and out of these only partially seen objects, the spectator is invited to touch with their eyes and see with their hands.

 

These are elements that we can find in several of Menken's works, such as in Glimpse of the Garden (1957), where her presence, inextricably linked to the imagery via the handheld camera movements, is layered upon this sensuous and even tactile dimension. Moreover, the intricate and elaborate editing adds depth to this visual poem: Menken starts with a rather Cartesian composition—wide shots, with a lot of depth to them, where we can see Ripley's garden and greenhouse. She then goes onto methodically reducing the shot size and depth. Amidst this beautifully conducted reduction of the distance between the spectator and the imagery, Menken turns on herself. This slightly disorienting and completely unexpected camera movement comes announce the twists and turns that follow—she walks through trees, she zooms in on a bush of flowers (cutting between each shot variation), moves the camera around in every direction at an ever increasing speed, etc.—until all is suddenly interrupted by a reflection of the greenhouse we saw in the beginning, except this one doesn’t seem to belong to the world she's been showing so far. Furthermore, this image comes sooth, but also briefly (and only slightly) shock the spectator. What this image does, as well, is vehemently deny any sort of pre-established distance between the spectator and the work, by transforming this previously Cartesian image, into a haptic one (the image is now dark, it lacks depth, and it is textured by the movement of the water). Another element underlining this refusal of any kind of distance is the continuity of the soundtrack (birds chirping and singing), unaltered from the beginning until the end of this beautiful film.

 

Dwightiana (1959), a stop-motion of Dwight Ripley's images, comes add a little lightheartedness to the first section of this edition, something characteristic of the artist, whose visual poems are as varied as her curiosity.

 

We go back to the hapticity of the first couple of works with Arabesque for Kenneth Anger (1961), although here this is done through close-ups of heavily detailed architecture, and water. Once again we witness an increase in speed, which when complemented by the music of Teiji Ito, makes for an exciting sensorial experience.