Diversifications

Date: 26 May 2002 | Season: Shoot Shoot Shoot 2002 | Tags:

DIVERSIFICATIONS
Sunday 26 May 2002, at 3pm
London Tate Modern

From personal montage through to exploration of the cinematic process, the work was sensuous and playful. As a creative group, the Co-op covered vital aesthetic ground and resisted categorisation. This programme does not pursue a single theme or concept, rather it demonstrates the broad range of work that was produced during this time.

The exposition section of Annabel Nicolson’s Shapes reveals its tactile evolution, as visible dirt is made evident by the step-printing technique. Moving into real time, the multiple layers of superimposition present strange spatial dimensions as the filmmaker toys with light, moving among the paper structures in her room. Footsteps engages the camera (viewer) in a playful game of “statues”. The film was often presented as a live performance in which Marilyn Halford crept up on her own projected likeness. Le Grice’s Talla adopts an almost mythical pose. Images slowly encroach on the frame as the visual tension rises, later to explode in spectacularly bending, twisting single-frame bursts. The brief, rapid-fire collage White Lite by Jeff Keen is made up of baffling layers of live action, stop-motion, obliteration and assemblage. Anne Rees-Mogg’s Muybridge Film, in homage to the pioneer of motion photography, constructs a playful film by breaking down a sequence into its constituent frames. Moment is an unmediated look, erotic but not explicit, as saturated as its celluloid. It’s a key work of Dwoskin’s early sensual portraits of solitary girls, in which the returning stare challenges our objective / subjective gaze. Chris Welsby’s Windmill II is one of a series in which propeller blades rotate in front of the camera, acting as a second shutter, controlled by an unpredictable and natural force. In this instance, the blades are backed with a reflective material that offers a glance back at the recording device intermittent with the zoetropic view of the park. In The Girl Chewing Gum, by John Smith, the narration appears to direct everyday life before breaking down, causing the viewer to question the accepted relationship between sound and image, the suggestive power of language. Chinese images and slogans are transformed by split-screen, ingrained dirt and hand-held photography to create a visual pun in Ian Kerr’s film, from “Persisting in our struggle” to Persisting in our vision.

Annabel Nicolson, Shapes, 1970, colour, silent, 7 min (18fps)
Marilyn Halford, Footsteps, 1974, b/w, sound, 6 min
Malcolm Le Grice, Talla, 1968, b/w, silent, 20 min
Jeff Keen, White Lite, 1968, b/w, silent, 2.5 min
Anne Rees-Mogg, Muybridge Film, 1975, b/w, silent, 5 min
Stephen Dwoskin, Moment, 1968, colour, sound, 12 min
Chris Welsby, Windmill II, 1973, colour, sound, 10 min
John Smith, The Girl Chewing Gum, 1976, b/w, sound, 12 min
Ian Kerr, Persisting, 1975, colour, sound, 10 min

Screening introduced by Marilyn Halford

PROGRAMME NOTES

The Epic Flight: Mare’s Tail

Date: 28 May 2002 | Season: Shoot Shoot Shoot 2002 | Tags:

THE EPIC FLIGHT: MARE’S TAIL
Tuesday 28 May 2002, at 6:30pm
London Tate Modern

“From one flick of the mare’s tail came an unending stream of images out of which was crystalised the milky way. Primitive, picaresque cinema.” (David Larcher)

An extended personal odyssey which, through an accumulation of visual information, builds into a treatise on the experience of seeing. Its loose, indefinable structure explores new possibilities for perception and narrative.

David Larcher, Mare’s Tail, 1969, colour, sound, 143 min

Reinforcing the idea of the mythopoeic discourse and the historically romantic view of the artist-filmmaker, Mare’s Tail is a legend, consisting of layers of sounds and images that reveal each other over an extended period. It’s a personal vision, an aggregation of experience, memories and moments overlaid with indecipherable intonations and altered musics. The collected footage is extensively manipulated, through refilming, superimposition or direct chemical treatment. The observer may slip in and out of the film as it runs its course; it does not demand constant attention, though persistence is rewarded by experience after the full projection has been endured.

While studying at the Royal College of Art, David Larcher made a first film KO (1964-65, with soundtrack composed by Philip Glass), which was subsequently disassembled and small sections incorporated in Mare’s Tail (a recurrent practise that continues through his later works). Encouraged by contact with true independent filmmakers like Peter Whitehead and Conrad Rooks, Larcher set out on to document his own life in a quasi-autobiographical manner.

Though financed by wealthy patron Alan Power, Mare’s Tail was, in its technical fabrication, a self-sufficient project made before the Co-op had any significant workshop equipment. At times, Larcher was living in a truck, and stories of films processed in public lavatories in the Scottish Highlands do not seem far from the truth.  His relationship to the Co-op has always been slightly distanced, though his lifestyle impressed and influenced many of the younger, more marginal figures.

His next film, Monkey’s Birthday (1975, six hours long), was shot over several years’ travels across the world with his entourage, and this time made full use of the Co-op processor to achieve its psychedelic effect.

Screening introduced by David Larcher.

PROGRAMME NOTES

8mm Films from the London Co-op

Date: 29 May 2002 | Season: Infinite Projection, Shoot Shoot Shoot 2002 | Tags:

8MM FILMS FROM THE LONDON CO-OP
Wednesday 29 May 2002, at 7:30pm
London The Photographers’ Gallery

The home movie format of 8mm can empower artists to make extremely personal and direct film observations. Spontaneity and intimacy are inherent to this pocket sized system. This special evening of single and multi-screen small gauge wonders concludes Shoot Shoot Shoot, a major retrospective of British avant-garde film, which screens at Tate Modern throughout May. Many of the makers will be on hand to introduce their work.

David Crosswaite, Puddle, UK, 1968, b/w, silent, 4 min
Mike Dunford, Four Short Films, UK, 1969, b/w & colour, silent, 10 min
Mike Dunford, One Million Unemployed in Winter 1971, UK, 1971, colour, sound-on-tape, 4 min
Jeff Keen, Wail, UK, 1960, colour, silent, 5 min
Jeff Keen, Like the Time is Now, UK, 1961, colour, silent, 6 min
Malcolm Le Grice, China Tea, UK, 1965, colour, silent, 10 min
Annabel Nicolson, Black Gate, UK, 1976, colour, silent, 4 min
Sally Potter, Jerk, UK, 1969, b/w, silent, 3 min (two screen)
William Raban, Sky, UK, 1969, colour, silent, 5 min (four screen)
John Smith, Out the Back, UK, 1974, colour, silent, 4 min

David Crosswaite, Mike Dunford, Malcolm Le Grice, Sally Potter, William Raban and John Smith in attendence.

PROGRAMME NOTES

SHOOT SHOOT SHOOT: Tour 2002-04

Date: 1 June 2002 | Season: Shoot Shoot Shoot 2002 | Tags:

SHOOT SHOOT SHOOT: THE FIRST DECADE OF THE LONDON FILM-MAKERS’ COOPERATIVE & BRITISH AVANT-GARDE FILM 1966-76
June 2002–August 2002

International touring exhibition consisting of eight programmes of single-screen, double screen films and expanded cinema 

May 2002 – London, UK – Tate Modern
June 2002 – Paris, France – Scratch Projections at Centre Wallonie Bruxelles / EOF Gallery
July 2002 – Brisbane, Australia – Brisbane International Film Festival / Institute for Modern Art
July 2002 – Melbourne, Australia – Melbourne International Film Festival / Experimenta / Gamma Space
September 2002 – Berlin, Germany – Arsenal / Deutsche Kinemathek
September 2002 – Karlsruhe, Germany – Kinemathek / Kamera Kunstverein
September 2002 – Frankfurt, Germany – Deutsches Filmmuseum
September 2002 – Bremen, Germany – Kino 46 / Hochschule für Künste
October 2002 – Hamburg, Germany – Metropolis Kino / Lichtmeß
November 2002 – Basel, Switzerland – Kunsthalle Basel / Stadtkino Basel
November 2002 – Barcelona, Spain – Fundació Antoni Tàpies / Hangar
November 2002 – Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain – ARTIUM
March 2003 – New York. USA – Anthology Film Archives / Galapagos Art Space
May 2003 – Manchester, UK – Cornerhouse
May 2003 – Gateshead, UK – BALTIC / Side Cinema
March 2004 – Athens, Greece – Deste Foundation
April 2004 –Tokyo, Japan – Image Forum Festival / Hillside Gallery
May 2004 – Kyoto, Japan – Goethe Institut Kyoto
August 2004 –Seoul, Korea – 1st Seoul Experimental Film Festival


Nothing in Common: 40 Years of the London Film-Makers’ Coop

Date: 13 October 2006 | Season: Shoot Shoot Shoot 2006 | Tags:

NOTHING IN COMMON: 40 YEARS OF THE LONDON FILM-MAKERS’ COOP
Friday 13 October 2006, at 5pm
London Frieze Art Fair

The London Film-Makers’ Co-operative (LFMC) was established 40 years ago today, on 13 October 1966. An artist-led project, it incorporated a distribution collection, screening room and film workshop. It grew from an informal film society into one of the major international centres of avant-garde cinema and its films form the basis of the current LUX collection. Many LFMC filmmakers experimented with projection techniques, creating expanded cinema performances, installations and multi-screen films, with artists such as Malcolm Le Grice prefiguring much of contemporary practice with his remarkable body of work. In Castle One, made from scraps of footage found outside commercial film labs, a photoflood light bulb is hung directly in front of the screen and flashed intermittently during projection, bleaching out the image, illuminating the screening room and breaking down the relationship between film and audience. Gill Eatherley’s Aperture Sweep, from her ‘Light Occupations’ series of film related activities, is a double screen performance in which Eatherley, armed with a broom (amplified to be both seen and heard), appears to sweep the screen clean for future projections. Both pieces attempt a kind of erasure of the onscreen image, conceptually and physically challenging the roles of maker and spectator. 

Malcolm Le Grice, Castle One, UK, 1966, 16mm/performance, 20 min
Gill Eatherley, Aperture Sweep, UK, 1973, 16mm/performance, 10 min

‘Nothing in Common’, curated by Mark Webber, is a special presentation of The Artists Cinema.


Shoot Shoot Shoot Condensed 2006-08

Date: 10 November 2006 | Season: Shoot Shoot Shoot 2006 | Tags:

SHOOT SHOOT SHOOT: BRITISH AVANT-GARDE FILM OF THE 1960s & 1970s
November 2006 – May 2008
International Touring Programme

The 1960s and 1970s were groundbreaking decades in which independent filmmakers challenged cinematic convention. In England, much of the innovation took place at the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative, an artist-led organisation that enabled filmmakers to control every aspect of the creative process. LFMC members conducted an investigation of celluloid that echoed contemporary developments in painting and sculpture. During this same period, British filmmakers also made significant innovations in the field of ‘expanded cinema’, creating multi-screen projections, film environments and live performance pieces.

The physical production of a film (its printing and processing) became integral to its form and content as Malcolm Le Grice, Lis Rhodes, Peter Gidal and others explored the material and mechanics of cinema, making radical new works that contributed to a new visual language. The London Film-Makers’ Co-operative, which was established on 13th October 1966, grew from a film society at the heart of London’s sixties counterculture to become Europe’s largest distributor of experimental cinema and was recognised internationally as a major centre for avant-garde film.

“Shoot Shoot Shoot: The First Decade of the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative & British Avant-Garde Film 1966-76” was a major research and exhibition project that toured worldwide from 2002-04. The original 8 programme package of single screen films, multiple projection works and expanded cinema performances that was shown at 19 venues including London Tate Modern, Gateshead Baltic, Basel Kunsthalle, Barcelona Fundaçio Antoní Tapies, Athens Desté Foundation, Tokyo Image Forum and the Melbourne International Film Festival.

This new package is being made available on the 40th anniversary of the LFMC to support the release of the DVD “Shoot Shoot Shoot: British Avant-Garde Film of the 1960s & 1970s” in Autumn 2006. The two programmes contain several films that are not on the DVD and some which were not included in the original tour.

10 & 11 November 2006, London Tate Modern
3 February 2007, Birmingham MAC
29 March 2007, Glasgow Transmission Gallery
25 April 2007, Osnabruck European Media Art Festival
29 May 2007, Nottingham Broadway Cinema and Media Centre (Programme 2 only)
13 & 14 June 2007, Brussels Cinémathèque royale de Belgique
25 & 30 September 2007, Zagreb 25 FPS Festival
16 October 2007, Portland Cinema Project
27 October 2007, Pittsburgh Filmmakers
8 & 9 November 2007, Rochester Visual Studies Workshop
24 & 25 November 2007, Toronto Cinematheque Ontario
29 January & 5 February 2008, Milwaukee Union Theatre
4 & 11 March 2008, Berkeley Pacific Film Archive
2 & 16 March 2008, Los Angeles Filmforum
27 & 31 May 2008, Zurich Videoex

“Shoot Shoot Shoot” is a LUX project. Curated by Mark Webber.


Shoot Shoot Shoot Condensed 2006-08: Programme 1

Date: 10 November 2006 | Season: Shoot Shoot Shoot 2006 | Tags:

SHOOT SHOOT SHOOT CONDENSED: PROGRAMME 1
November 2006—May 2008
International Tour

The London Film-Makers’ Co-operative was established in 1966 to support work on the margins of art and cinema. It uniquely incorporated three related activities within a single organisation – a workshop for producing new films, a distribution arm for promoting them, and its own cinema space for screenings. In this environment, Co-op members were free to explore the medium and control every stage of the process. The Materialist tendency characterised the hardcore of British filmmaking in the early 1970s. Distinguished from Structural Film, these works were primarily concerned with duration and the raw physicality of the celluloid strip.

Annabel Nicolson, Slides, 1970, colour, silent, 11 mins (18fps)
Guy Sherwin, At the Academy, 1974, b/w, sound, 5 mins
Mike Leggett, Shepherd’s Bush, 1971, b/w, sound, 15 mins
David Crosswaite, Film No. 1, 1971, colour, sound, 10 mins
Lis Rhodes, Dresden Dynamo, 1971, colour, sound, 5 mins
Chris Garratt, Versailles I & II, 1976, b/w, sound, 11 mins
Mike Dunford, Silver Surfer, 1972, b/w, sound, 15 mins
Marilyn Halford, Footsteps, 1974, b/w, sound, 6 mins

PROGRAMME NOTES

Shoot Shoot Shoot Condensed 2006-08: Programme 2

Date: 11 November 2006 | Season: Shoot Shoot Shoot 2006 | Tags:

SHOOT SHOOT SHOOT CONDENSED: PROGRAMME 2
November 2006—May 2008
International Tour

The 1960s and 1970s were a defining period for artists’ film and video in which avant-garde filmmakers challenged cinematic convention. In England, much of the innovation took place at the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative, an artist-led organisation that incorporated a distribution office, projection space and film workshop. Despite the workshop’s central role in production, not all the work derives from experimentation in printing and processing. Filmmakers also used language, landscape and the human body to create less abstract works that still explore the essential properties of the film medium.

Malcolm Le Grice, Threshold, 1972, colour, sound, 10 mins
Chris Welsby, Seven Days, 1974, colour, sound, 20 mins
Peter Gidal, Key, 1968, colour, sound, 10 mins
Stephen Dwoskin, Moment, 1968, colour, sound, 12 mins
Gill Eatherley, Deck, 1971, colour, sound, 13 mins
William Raban, Colours of this Time, 1972, colour, silent, 3 mins
John Smith, Associations, 1975, colour, sound, 7 mins

PROGRAMME NOTES

Shoot Shoot Shoot: DVD Launch and Performances

Date: 24 November 2006 | Season: Shoot Shoot Shoot 2006 | Tags:

SHOOT SHOOT SHOOT: DVD LAUNCH AND PERFORMANCES
Friday 24 November 2006, at 8PM
London Candid Arts Trust

A special expanded cinema performance event to mark the release of the new LUX / Re:Voir DVD “Shoot Shoot Shoot: British Avant-Garde Film of the 1960s and 1970s”.

The evening will include two performances: Guy Sherwin’s Configuration has not been performed since 1976, and William Raban’s Wave Formations will be projected for the first time in its new arrangement.

Guy Sherwin, Configuration, 1976, for 2 x Super-8 projectors and live performer, 10 min
“In this film performance a hand-held projector and a stationary projector reproduce the movements of the two cameras used in making the film. The film was made outdoors in a clearing in a wood. The filmmaker held one camera and moved in a circle around the stationary camera while recording variations of the same view. The two cameras occasionally cross each other’s path. In time we see the gradual approach of a figure towards the two cameras and her subsequent involvement in the act of filming. During the performance, the two films are projected together onto a screen. The performer holds one projector and moves in a circle around the stationary projector, echoing the original camera movements. At times, shadows of projector and projectionist are thrown upon the screen.” —Guy Sherwin, 2006

William Raban, Wave Formations, 1977-2006, for 5 x 16mm projectors, 2 x strobe lights and live performer, 25 min
“Part one: Variation in Density: The picture on each of the five screens are identical, seven second fades from black, through clear, to black again. The same fade is printed onto the optical sound track to synchronise with the picture. Then follow fades from light to dark. And from dark to light. Part Two: Intermittency: Relative patterns of occlusion and exposure occupy two screens. Each exposure fires a stroboscopic flash of colour: yellow for one screen; blue for the other, filling the centre of both screens with colour, haloed with after-image complementaries.” —William Raban, 1978


Shoot Shoot Shoot: Expanded Cinema

Date: 23 May 2007 | Season: Shoot Shoot Shoot 2006 | Tags:

SHOOT SHOOT SHOOT: EXPANDED CINEMA
Wednesday 23 May 2007, at 7PM
Wrexham Arts Centre

Beginning in the 1960s, artists at the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative experimented with multiple projection, live performance and film environments. In liberating cinema from traditional theatrical presentation, they broke down the barrier between screen and audience, and extended the creative act to the moment of exhibition. “Shoot Shoot Shoot” presents historic works of Expanded Cinema, for which each screening is a unique, collective experience, in stark contrast to contemporary video installations. In Line Describing a Cone, a film projected through smoke, light becomes an apparently solid, sculptural presence, whilst other works for multiple projection create dynamic relationships between images and sounds.

Malcolm Le Grice, Castle Two, 1968, b/w, sound, 32 min (2 screens)
Sally Potter, Play, 1971, b/w & colour, silent, 7 min (2 screens)
William Raban, Diagonal, 1973, colour, sound, 6 min (3 screens)
Gill Eatherley, Hand Grenade, 1971, colour, sound, 8 min (3 screens)
Lis Rhodes, Light Music, 1975-77, b/w, sound, 20 min (2 screens)
Anthony McCall, Line Describing A Cone, 1973, b/w, silent, 30 min. (1 screen, smoke)

Curated by Mark Webber. Presented in association with LUX.

PROGRAMME NOTES