Gregory J. Markopoulos (1928-92) was one of the most original filmmakers to emerge in post-war American cinema. His films, which encompass mythic themes, portraiture and studies of landscape and architecture, are celebrated for their extraordinary creativity, the sensuous use of colour and innovations in cinematic form. By employing complex editing techniques and spontaneous in-camera superimposition, he sought to unlock the mystery and energy contained within the single frame. As a contemporary of Maya Deren, Kenneth Anger and Jonas Mekas, Markopoulos was amongst those at the forefront of a movement that liberated cinema as an artistic mode of expression. Having made his first 16mm film (Psyche) as a student in 1947, he went on to produce several key works of the New American Cinema such as Twice a Man (1963) and The Illiac Passion (1964-67).
Slow Writing is a collection of articles by Thom Andersen that reflect on the avant-garde, Hollywood feature films, and contemporary cinema. His critiques of artists and filmmakers as diverse as Yasujirō Ozu, Nicholas Ray, Andy Warhol, and Christian Marclay locate their work within the broader spheres of popular culture, politics, history, architecture, and the urban landscape. The city of Los Angeles and its relationship to film is a recurrent theme.
"From one flick of the mare’s tail came an unending stream of images out of which was crystallised the milky way." – David Larcher
In collaboration with LUX we’re thrilled to present a rare 16mm screening of David Larcher’s Mare’s Tail to mark the publication of Shoot Shoot Shoot: The First Decade of the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative 1966-76 – a compendium of texts, interviews, images and documents from the era. Mark Webber will introduce the film and copies of the book will be available to purchase before the screening.
Frieze Video and LUX present Soft Floor, Hard Film: 50 Years of the London Film-Makers’ Co-op.
Formed on October 13th 1968, the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative (LFMC) grew out of a series of screenings in the basement of counter-culture book store, Better Books, on Charing Cross road to become a pioneering organisation incorporating a film workshop, cinema space and distribution office. Radical in its early ideals, the Co-op played a crucial role in establishing moving image as an art form in the UK and internationally.
The 1960s and 1970s were a defining period for artists’ film and video, and the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative (LFMC) was one of the major international centres. Shoot Shoot Shoot documents the first decade of an artist-led organisation that pioneered the moving image as an art form in the UK, tracing its development from within London’s counterculture towards establishing its own identity within premises that uniquely incorporated a distribution office, cinema space and film workshop.
A screening of four films by Peter Gidal to celebrate the publication of “Flare Out: Aesthetics 1966–2016”, a collection of his essays on film, art and aesthetics. Gidal was a central figure during the formative years of the London Film-Makers’ Co-op and made some its most radical works. His cinema is anti-narrative, against representation and fiercely materialist, and his writings are similarly polemical and unique. This programme of films from the 1960s to the present includes his most recent work, and will be introduced by Mark Webber and Peter Gidal.
An afternoon of screenings celebrating the first decade of LUX’s predecessor, the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative (1966–76). The LFMC was founded in October 1966 as a non-commercial distributor of avant-garde cinema. In contrast to similar groups that emerged around the world, it grew to incorporate a distribution service, cinema space and film laboratory. Within this unique facility, filmmakers were able to control every aspect of the creative process.
This collection of essays by Peter Gidal includes “Theory and Definition of Structural/Materialist Film” and other texts on metaphor, narrative, and against sexual representation. Also discussed in their specificity are works by Samuel Beckett, Thérèse Oulton, Gerhard Richter and Andy Warhol. Throughout, Gidal’s writing attempts a political aesthetics, polemical as well as theoretical. One of the foremost experimental film-makers in Britain since the late 1960s, Peter Gidal was a central figure at the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative, and taught advanced film theory at the Royal College of Art. His previous books include Andy Warhol: Films and Paintings (1971), Understanding Beckett (1986) and Materialist Film (1989).
Film as Film: Theory and Practice in the Work of Gregory J. Markopoulos Symposium & Screenings Basel, 23 & 24 April 2015
Basel University, eikones Forum and Stadkino Basel will host Film as Film: Theory and Practice in the Work of Gregory J. Markopoulos on 23 & 24 April 2015. This symposium and screening series is the first of its kind to be focused on Markopoulos, and will bring together many of the most knowledgeable individuals interested in his work. This event is open to the public.
The Greek-American filmmaker Gregory J. Markopoulos (1928–1992) was one of the key figures in the development of postwar avant-garde film, and a co-founder of the New American Cinema Group. In his exquisitely stylized and dreamlike early films, and in the stunning works of the sixties and seventies, Markopoulos formulated a maverick aesthetic characterized by incomparable formal rigor, fascinating beauty, and the penetrating representation of interior worlds that emerge from the entwinement of image and sound into an ecstatic filmic language.
Belgian experimental film festival L’Âge d’or 'returns' to Brussels on October 8-14. 'Reviving the spirit' of the EXPRMNTL festival will present twenty-three films in competition as well as programmes dedicated to and with the presence of Birgit Hein (president of the jury), Gustav Deutsch (who will also deliver a masterclass), Friedl vom Gröller, Matthias Müller and Christoph Girardet, Robert Todd and John Smith. Mark Webber, editor of the recently published anthology of writings by Gregory Markopoulos will introduce two programmes of his works with new prints. The festival will also pay homage to Stephen Dwoskin and Adolfas Mekas and present curated programmes dedicated to the Italian avant-garde, and a double selection of “ethnographic poems”, with works by Raymonde Carasco and Robert Gardner.
The festival's brochure, including the complete programme, can be downloaded here.
