THOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO · PDF fileTHOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO...

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THOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO NOVEMBER 19, 2012 8:30 PM presented by REDCAT Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater California Institute of the Arts

Transcript of THOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO · PDF fileTHOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO...

Page 1: THOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO  · PDF fileTHOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO NOVEMBER 19, 2012 8:30 PM presented by REDCAT Roy and

THOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO

NOVEMBER 19, 2012 8:30 PM

presented by

REDCAT

Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater

California Institute of the Arts

Page 2: THOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO  · PDF fileTHOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO NOVEMBER 19, 2012 8:30 PM presented by REDCAT Roy and

Mon Nov 19 | 8:30 pm |Jack H. Skirball Series

With Reconversão (Reconversion), Thom Andersen opens another fascinating chapter of his ongoing investigation of architectural landscapes, their filmic representation, and their relation to history, by focusing on 17 buildings and projects by the often-controversial Portuguese architect Eduardo Souto de Moura—winner of the 2011 Pritzker Prize. Echoing Dziga Vertov’s concepts and Eadweard Muybridge’s techniques (shooting only one or two frames per second), Andersen masterfully brings forward what makes Souto de Moura’s artistic originality: the incorporation of the passing of time into architectural designs, positing them within a history fraught with class struggle and societal changes, in a continuum with ruins—from which they may originate, and to which they will return—and with nature—which they frame, and by which they are framed.

In person: Thom Andersen

“… an elegiac quest into the essence of Eduardo Souto de Moura’s architecture.” — Celluloid Liberation Front

“Is a film about architecture a boring proposal? Yes, in 99% of the cases, but this is not the case of Reconversão, which is permeable to irony. Is the program didactic? Yes, and efficacious, but it goes beyond this level. With the accurate choice of the points of view, and the melodic voice-over which goes along with them (based on work notes by the architect and what Thom Andersen found on location), Reconversão not only establishes an affectionate relationship with the work of Souto Moura, but also reframes it through a political journey over the last three decades of history of the north of the country. In Vila do Conde Festival, from all the films we saw, no other was superior to it.” — Francisco Ferreira, Expresso-Atual

“Although Andersen was invited specifically to make the film in Portugal on the occasion of the Vila do Conde festival’s 20th anniversary, his attentiveness to the Pritzker prize winning architect’s buildings and unbuilt projects is equal to the revered contemplation of his hometown in 2003’s Los Angeles Plays Itself.

— Experimenta Weekend – Artists Films and Videos at the BFI London Film Festival

THOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO

Page 3: THOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO  · PDF fileTHOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO NOVEMBER 19, 2012 8:30 PM presented by REDCAT Roy and

“Thom Andersen’s essay films look at cinema as a technology of political imagination and a secret repository of cultural memory.” — Whitney Museum of American Art

“Andersen’s intellectually challenging, politically incisive film essays are masterfully woven counter-histories, distinctive for their invaluable examination of neglected aspects of cultural history.” — Northwest Filmforum

“Change the past, it needs it.” — Thom Andersen

“As Pedro Costa said, ‘the primary function of cinema is to make us feel that something isn’t right.’ That is, cinema can and should be didactic. It is by becoming didactic that it shows us something we know but makes it strange and new.”

— Thom Andersen (excerpt of a text on the cinema of Ozu Yasujirô)

Curated by Steve Anker and Bérénice Reynaud

Funded in part with generous support from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Over a 45-year career that has combined filmmaking, criticism, and teaching, Thom Andersen has completed a handful of carefully crafted documentaries that demonstrate an exquisite regard for both intellectual and aesthetic rigor. Comprised primarily of found images and video clips, unified by voiceover, Edward Muybridge, Zoopraxographer (1974), Red Hollywood (1995 – co-directed with Noël Burch) and Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003) analyze the production of images and their theoretical, social, and political consequences… Get Out of the Car (2010), which premiered in Locarno and has been screened in dozens of festivals is a direct response to Los Angeles Plays Itself. However, it also returns him to his unself-conscious roots. This is Andersen’s other side, last heard from in the ‘60s with Melting (1964-65, a time lapse shot of an ice cream sundae), the ‘deliberately unpronounceable’ --- ----- (1966-67, with Malcolm Brodwick, a sensory exploration of rock and roll subculture in Los Angeles) and Olivia’s Place (1966/74, a portrait of a Santa Monica coffee shop and its patrons). These short 16mm films reveal an artist with an original take on film as document, who is energized by popular music and an idiosyncratic sense of humor. (adapted from an article published in Cinema Scope)

Page 4: THOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO  · PDF fileTHOM ANDERSEN MEETS SOUTO DE MOURA: RECONVERSÃO NOVEMBER 19, 2012 8:30 PM presented by REDCAT Roy and

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