MAKING LIGHT OF IT

For those who might have missed it, the latest issue of Cinema Scope was recently released, certainly one of the more informative periodicals available to cinephiles and always a cause for celebration.  Of particular note is an engaging interview/consideration of the boundary-blurring [and gorgeously hand-processed] work of British artist Ben Rivers by Michael Sicinski.  Behind Mark McElhatten's programming, Rivers was in attendance for what at the time was a near complete retrospective of his work at the Brakhage Symposium two years ago, an experience that to these eyes ran the gamut from bewilderment to exhilaration and everything in between.  Having recently spent some time considering the idea of document in art [as opposed to established traditions associated with the term documentary], it was especially rewarding to read Rivers elaborate his process of experiencing

"the world in a particular place, with my camera in hand, and film instinctively at certain points. I’m gathering physical material that, as a set of individual images, has no meaning. Then through the subsequent process of editing, these images attain a new life, which isn’t necessarily about giving them new meaning, but giving them a rhythm which will enable them to become an experience of the film itself and not a representation of something else"

a process that would clearly seem to exist along this line of document that has proved so alluringly allusive for a great many artists.  When it comes to online writing [or writing in any format for that matter] on avant-garde/experimental film unfortunately our options tend to be on the slimmer side of things, lucky for us Sicinski is damn good at what he does, so be sure to take advantage of the offering...