THE NEW PARAGONE: THE CINEMA AND VANGUARD ART MOVEMENTS

A recurrent topic in aesthetics has been the paragone (Italian for “comparison”), in which one art (painting, sculpture, poetry) is compared with the others and declared the ottima arte, or “top art.” Ryerson University, upon the publication of R. Bruce Elder’s latest book, Harmony and Dissent: Film and Avant-garde Art Movements in the Early Twentieth Century (Wilfred Laurier University Press) will host a workshop exploring cinema’s explosive influence on the various vanguard art movements of the twentieth century, positing its status as the new paragone. Cinematheque Ontario is pleased to host  two exciting events during The New Paragone: The Cinema and Vanguard Art Movements (March 12 -15), welcoming the multi-talented and multi-disciplinary Christian Lebrat to present a solo programme of his film works, including his latest foray into video. And with an eye to cinema’s historical aspirations, we are delighted to welcome Robert A. Haller back to Cinematheque Ontario to present a rare archival programme from Anthology Film Archives, where he is the Director of Collections and Special Projects and has been responsible for preserving some of the key works of avant-garde cinema. – Andréa Picard

“If you are a filmmaker you have to deal with this very strong characteristic of cinema: on one hand you work with the celluloid which is a very concrete medium. You can touch it, cut it, work frame by frame and so on, and on the other hand, when this celluloid is projected, the concrete images are transformed into projected light. So, when you make a film, you must keep in mind that the celluloid on which the images are printed will be transformed into light by the projector. For this reason, the work of a filmmaker is essentially to do with rhythm, speed, movement and mutations of light.” – Christian Lebrat

Based in Paris, Christian Lebrat is an internationally acclaimed artist with a career spanning over thirty years. He is a filmmaker, video and performance artist and photographer, as well as a publisher, curator and writer. In 1985 he founded Paris Expérimental (www.paris-experimental.asso.fr), a publishing company entirely devoted to theoretical and historical texts on avant-garde and experimental cinema. Since 1976 he has created over twenty experimental films, videos, and film performances, along with a formidable body of photographic work. Lebrat’s films actively explore the “between” nature of the cinematic image, in particular the way the image is a co-creation of human perception and projected light. Intricate rhythms emerge through the viewer’s perception of variations between successive film frames, and nuanced vibrations appear between juxtaposed bands of coloured light. The colour field paintings of Mark Rothko and the metrical films of Peter Kubelka have been key influences in Lebrat’s development of a unique cinematic form that deeply elucidates affective aspects of human perception.