Underskog

Argentinian Perspectives 2

Beginning with two modern classics from ‘71 and ’81 and followed by five more recent offerings, this selection gives a taste of the range and energy of the work being made in Argentina now.
“…The history of these films ….is also the history of reduced formats taken to supernatural levels of esthetic possibility. The economy of resources here is the point of departure towards unprecedented formal work” Pablo Marin

Come Out Narcissa Hirsch (Super 8 / 11mins / 1971)
A “programmatic, hermetic and minimal” film, consisting of only two shots: a blurred image that gradually comes into focus and a shot of the title of the piece we are listening to: Come Out (1966) by Steve Reich. The moment when the sound is clearest coincides with the greatest degree of visual abstraction, and vice versa.

Gamelan Claudio Caldini (Super 8 / 11mins / 1981)
“I dedicated myself to observing the movement of small cameras….spinning rapidly produces strange and concentric figures… I made the camera rotate counterclockwise. Soon it reached sufficient speed to sustain itself in orbit…” CC

Malabia Bla Bla Sergio Subero & Sergio Brauer (Super8 / 6mins / 2011)
A pale negative interior dissolves into light which emerges torn and overlayed with dust and particles, set to a haunting soundtrack by Alan Courtis.

Espectro Sergio Subero (16mm / 8mins / 2010)
Filmed ‘backwards’ through the eyepiece of the camera, Espectro (Spector) is the result of an experiment which could not be controlled or measured before being made. Soundtrack : Alan Courtis.

4×4 Pablo Marin (Super 8 / 4mins / 2012)
A cactus tree; wind, sea and fire. A mad rush through the city. Thin reeds wave in the water, more fire and a brooding sky.

Conjeturas Pablo Mazzolo (16mm / 4mins / 2013)
Conjectures about the animal that bumps into itself, aims for big things and gets sick of it all.

Fotooxidation Pablo Mazzolo ( 16mm / 13mins / 2013)
An intense barrage of superimpositions begin the film ; city life is intercut with an extreme and alarming close-up of a young boy staring blindly past the camera. In the second act, we move to a night scene, and the soundtrack turns increasingly aggressive. The boy with the eyes returns. Lights pass through trees; scientific equations are flashed up … the film ends in a field of tall grass. A tangled, strange and unsettling work.

This programme was beautifully supported by the PNEK organisation, Oslo.