In partnership with Vancity Theatre at the Vancouver International Film Centre, the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery is pleased to announce a special night of film screenings related to the exhibition Idyll, Marcus and McLuhan: Films by Al Razutis, David Rimmer and Arthur Lispett. On the 40th anniversary of May 1968, the Belkin Art Gallery presents three exhibitions – as well as works from our collection and documents from our archive – that address aspects of that revolutionary decade. On Thursday, July 24, 2008 we are pleased to show a selection of films that are both documents and analysis of that time.
7 PM
Al Razutis, Aaeon (1968-1970)
16mm, 24 minutes
An award winning artist and scholar, Al Razutis moved to Vancouver in the late 1960s and became an active participant in the experimental film scene. Released in 1970, Aaeon is based on experiments with dream recollection and is composed of four interwoven stanzas, continually developing to redefine mythological space/time.
Courtesy of Pacific Cinémathèque.
David Rimmer, Migration (1969)
DVD, 11 minutes
Among Canada’s best-known film artists, David Rimmer’s work explores the structural conventions of film as a medium and the particularities of perception in a lyrical, sometimes metaphorical manner. Migration uses rear-projection re-photography, stop-framing, multiple-framing, and slow motion to create a cinematic meditation on organic growth and decay.
Paul Alexander Juutilainen, Herbert’s Hippopotamus: Marcuse and Revolution in Paradise (1996)
DVD, 56 minutes
A combination of archival footage and contemporary interviews create a picture of the experience of Herbert Marcuse during his time as a professor at University of California at San Diego. The writings of Marcuse, a prominent member of the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory, were highly influential to student protest movements all over the world. However, Marcuse, a German Jew who fled before the war, was not as welcome in his adopted home.
9 PM
Arthur Lispett, 21 – 87 (1964)
DVD, 9 minutes and 33 seconds
An inspiration to directors such as Stanley Kubrick, George Lucas, and Guy Maddin, Arthur Lispett’s films had profound impact upon the Canadian and international festival scene in the 1960s. Lispett’s controversial body of work used avant-garde techniques such as montage and non-synchronic sound to cast a censorious eye upon the commercialism and hypocrisy of post-war North American society. 21 – 87 is comprised of found snippets of film from the editing room of National Film Board, intermixed with film shot by Lispett on the streets of cities such as New York City and Montreal.
Kevin McMahon, McLuhan’s Wake (2002)
DVD, 94 minutes
During the 1960s, Marshall McLuhan was heralded as both a genius and a charlatan. Two decades after his death, in a world that McLuhan seemingly foresaw, McLuhan’s Wake explores the enduring hold of his message. The film blends different forms of media and features voice over narration by renowned performance artist Laurie Anderson, and commentary by scholars Eric McLuhan, Neil Postman and Lewis Lapham, and award-winning journalist Patrick Watson.
