*CFP* "FILM EXHIBITION: THE ITALIAN CONTEXT", SYMPOSIUM AND EDITED VOLUME

This symposium and edited volume seeks to draw together research into cinematic exhibition in Italy throughout the twentieth and twenty-first century. Current research into Italian cinema is continuously expanding its purview to consider the great range of genres, forms and contexts that have been engaged by filmmakers working in the country. Similarly, recent studies have shone vital light on the complex make up of Italy’s film audiences, and on the practices of film producers and distributors in the country. This project will continue this critical expansion by investigating the myriad ways in which film media (both Italian and foreign) has been exhibited and consumed in Italy. It aims to investigate both the audience experience of film exhibition and the practices of exhibitors themselves (eg their programming habits, the construction and restoration of cinemas, their relationships with distributors and political organisations etc).

Possible subjects of discussion could include, but are not limited to:

• The screening of silent/early films at travelling fairs and other public events 
• The establishment/construction of Italy’s first purpose-built cinemas 
• The conversion of Italian cinemas to sound 

*CFP* "THE 'LITTLE APPARATUS': 100 YEARS OF 9.5MM FILM", INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

The ‘little apparatus’: 100 years of 9.5mm film

16, 17, 18 June 2022

University of Southampton

 

An international conference hosted in person and online by the Department of Film Studies’ Centre For International Film Research at the University of Southampton.

December 1922 will mark the centenary of the introduction of 9.5mm film to the French cinematographic market.  Pathé Freres first launched their ‘Pathé Baby’ home cinema system on domestic territory in time for the Christmas season, with the promise of a soon to follow lightweight and modestly priced cine-camera using the same narrow gauge, that could fit in a vest pocket (1923, pp. 48–50). In time, the new gauge became available elsewhere -arriving just ahead of Kodak’s 16mm film/cinema system and together signalling the first major boom in amateur filmmaking.

*CFP* CALL FOR PARTICIPATION, I INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM OF CINEMA AND FILM ANALYSIS

I International Symposium of Cinema and Film Analysis (Online)

17-19 November 2021

 

We are delighted to invite proposals from academic researchers to be presented at the I International Symposium of Cinema and Film Analysis; organized by the CNPq research group CineArte – Cinema, Film Analysis, and Intellectual Experience. The event will be held online from 17-19 November 2021, and our goal is to deepen and broaden the exchange between research works centered on film analysis by gathering different perspectives, observing the outcomes when selecting different theoretical approaches and methodologies, and seeing how film language can be intertwined with numerous fields of study.

We are interested in the moving image studies, sound, film analysis definitions, case studies, changes throughout the time, and debates centered beyond movies, such as the interchange between other fields of study within the Arts and Human Sciences. The Symposium is a result of an interdisciplinary exchange between researchers who investigate the relationship between cinema, audiovisual, by selecting film analysis as a methodology within different usages and contexts. 

*CFP* "COMPOSITE IMAGES", ISSUE 7, TRANSBORDEUR: PHOTOGRAPHIE HISTOIRE SOCIÉTÉ

What if the history of photography was ultimately less a history of recorded images than a history of images composed from recorded elements? The rise of assemblages and hybridisation practices in digital cultures prompts us to ask this question. What we today call memes juxtaposes elements that are willingly heterogeneous and whose contrast typically produces satirical effects. In another realm, we notice the proliferation of automatic image generation software that synthesises and combines real or fictional elements with a strong photorealistic charge, sometimes using deep learning technologies. Between these two poles, there’s a need to examine the wide range of practices which overturn the idea of photography as a capture of the real.

These shifts in the notion of photography are not, however, solely due to the rise of digital technology. They draw on a long history of the composite image that we intend to develop in the 7th issue of the journal Transbordeur. Talking about composite images rather than “photomontages” allows us to turn away from a narrative influenced mainly by the twentieth-century avant-gardes (Dadaism, Constructivism, Surrealism), and to broaden our point of view beyond the field of art. The modern Western discourse using the industrial metaphor of the mechanical assemblage of pre-existing elements does not cover all the ranges of photographic manipulation.

*CFP* "THE CINEMA OF APICHATPONG WEERASETHAKUL", CHAPTER BOOK

One of the several elements with which Thai auteur Apichatpong Weerasethakul indulges himself, is the notion of the body—the various adventures and misadventures of bodilyness, the bliss, the pangs, the illnesses and the suffering. As memory (or the lack of it)takes the centre-stage in his oeuvre, bodies—young and old, male and female, rural and urban, real and ethereal— are often forgotten, remembered and re-remembered in quick succession. Such embodied characters, in their varied entanglements with mnemonic and topographical occupations, haunt and are haunted by the setting. More often, the rural Thailand features as the backdrop of Weerasethakul's films with its multitudes of life: the daily interactions, the humdrum affairs, the tedious tasks, the necessary rituals and customs. And all these reverberate with a distinct south-east Asian palette. On the surface, there are these local images of Isaan, the livelihood of villagers and the continuing migration: some of the recurring subjects of his films that give his works a “national” character, enabling a global audience to explore the society, culture, politics and practices of both rural and urban population of Thailand. While on the greater curve, his films unearth concerns that are universal and complex. As Matthew Barrington observes, “When Weerasethakul uses his camera to focus on Isaan and the exploration of the voiceless Thai inhabitants it becomes useful to place Weerasethakul as a transnational filmmaker whose films provide an international audience for the documenting of the marginalised individuals who populate Isaan”.

*CFP* "DECENTRING THE AVANT-GARDE: LANDSCAPE, TRAVEL AND THE GAZE IN EXPERIMENTAL FILM AND VIDEO", SPECIAL ISSUE, VOL. 57, PAPERS ON LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE

The special issue of Papers on Language and Literature (vol. 57) aims to highlight the work of filmmakers working on the margins of the avant-garde, including those using traditional (8 mm or 16 mm) and new (hybrid) media formats, and the ways they (re)address the questions of landscape, travel and the gaze. Although certain avant-garde films, including those made by Vertov, Bolotowsky, Kubelka, Winkler, Lehman, Welsby, Snow, Fischinger, Dutta, Rashidi, Takahiko, Frampton, Brakhage and others, have received some attention from researchers, there exists a number of underrepresented works, which use landscape and travelogue forms to challenge the hegemonic master narratives and undermine the image of majority groups and interests, continuously breaking the taboos and censorship of the mainstream (film) culture. Likewise, this issue will hopefully extend the use of some recent revisionist theories, which have moved beyond structuralist-formalist thinking to incorporate intermediality and heterogeneity (Branden), spectatorship and (gendered) body politics (Lambert-Beatty), corporeal turn in avant-garde film (Osterweil), expanded cinema practices (Sutton), materialism (Walley) or personal registers (Kase), to the study of landscape and travelogue films, many of which clearly de-center formalist strategies.

*CFP* "DECENTRING THE AVANT-GARDE: LANDSCAPE, TRAVEL AND THE(OTHER'S) GAZE IN EXPERIMENTAL FILM AND VIDEO", SPECIAL ISSUE, PAPERS ON LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE JOURNAL

As experimental film practice is still the most prevalent in (yet not confined to) western Europe, North America and Britain, the special issue of Papers on Language and Literature aims to highlight the work of filmmakers working on the margins of the avant-garde, including those using traditional (8 mm or 16 mm) and new (hybrid) media formats, and the ways they (re)address the questions of landscape, travel and the other’s gaze. Although certain avant-garde films, including those made by Vertov, Bolotowsky, Kubelka, Winkler, Lehman, Welsby, Snow, Fischinger, Dutta, Rashidi, Takahiko, Frampton, Brakhage and others, have received some attention from researchers, there exists a number of underrepresented works, which use landscape and travelogue forms to challenge the hegemonic master narratives and undermine the image of majority groups and interests, continuously breaking the taboos and censorship of the mainstream (film) culture. Likewise, this special issue will hopefully extend the use of some recent revisionist theories, which have moved beyond structuralist-formalist thinking to incorporate intermediality and heterogeneity (Branden), spectatorship and (gendered) body politics (Lambert-Beatty), corporeal turn in avant-garde film (Osterweil), expanded cinema practices (Sutton), materialism (Walley) or personal registers (Kase), to the study of landscape and travelogue films, many of which clearly de-center formalist strategies.

*CFP* "(RE)FOCUS ON LANDSCAPE AND TRAVELOGUE FORMS IN AVANT-GARDE AND EXPERIMENTAL FILM", SPECIAL ISSUE, LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE JOURNAL

As evident in academic literature, the study of often marginalized avant-garde and experimental works, seen as a peripheral yet distinctive mode of film and art practice, is likely to facilitate contemporary film, visual arts and visual culture studies. Many post-war productions, including those directed by such artists and filmmakers as Vertov, Bolotowsky, Kubelka, Winkler, Lehman, Welsby, Snow, Fischinger, Dutta, Rashidi, Takahiko, Frampton, Brakhage and others, seem to have received little attention from researchers despite being successfully preserved by international centers dedicated to the conservation, study and exhibition of independent, experimental and avant-garde cinema. 

Moreover, both landscape and travelogue forms, although central for the history and aesthetics of many national literatures, art movements and cinemas, remain another underexposed aspect of 20th century experimental film imagery, which should be investigated in terms of periodization, production and meaning-making processes pertaining to the artist’s construction and rendering of the surrounding reality. Hence, given the paucity of material offering a number of in-depth scholarly analyses of works of individual artists, it seems that there is a growing need for publications in the field other than wide-ranging anthologies and interview books.

*CFP* “ART MANIFESTOS: THE FUTURE OF AN EVOLVING FORM”, CONFERENCE STREAM, UNIVERSITY OF LONDON

Art MANIFESTOS: The future of an evolving form

Conference Stream

London Conference in Critical Thought (LCCT)

5-6 July 2019

Goldsmiths, University of London

Organisers: Evangelos Chrysagis and Panos Kompatsiaris

At a time when many regard the manifesto as a thing of the past, a defunct format, others see a resurgence in the production of manifestos cross-culturally: artists and activists still passionately pen and perform manifesto-type declarations. These can take militant forms in the spirit of avant-garde/nihilistic negation or more reconciliatory forms in the spirit of today’s creative industries and moderate politics. The manifestos of today can range from artist and curatorial statements to press releases and declarations describing political groups or counter-hegemonic actions.

*CFP* "AVANT-GARDE AND POPULAR FORMS BETWEEN MUSIC AND VISUAL MEDIA", SPECIAL ISSUE Nº 33, CINÉMA&CIE INTERNATIONAL FILM STUDIES JOURNAL

In 1987, Simon Frith and Howard Horne’s "Art into Pop" questioned the rise of British Post-War popular music within the context of art schools, employing cross-terms such as “rock bohemians” and “pop situationists”. The authors focused on the 1970s and the aftermath of punk, finding a close relation between popular music forms and art forms in the contexts of several British cities as well as in New York City. More recently, Simon Reynolds traced the genealogy of an “artistic bias” in popular music back to the post-punk period of the late 1970s, when “art ideas affected actual musical practices” (2009: 365) due to the influence of not musically trained artists coming from the NYC experimental scene such as Yoko Ono and Brian Eno.

So far, scholarly investigations on the intersections between popular music and culture and avant-garde arts have been mostly limited to the social cultural milieu of only two decades (1960s/1970s) and two countries (U.S.A./U.K.). Essay such as Bernard Gendron’s "Between Montmartre and the Mudd Club" (2002) and Sytze Seenstra’s "We are the noise between the stations" (2003) constitute two notable exceptions through their reframing of the American punk scene and of David Byrne’s work through a diachronical comparison with French modernism and conceptual romanticism, respectively. They do not only reassess the collapse of hierarchical distinction between the social function played by high arts and mass culture with the advent of late modernity/postmodernity, but also take into serious consideration the relationships between different media domains.