Beyond Vision has a passion for stock footage and clips that communicate more than information - iconic moments that enrich our experience of the world, snatches of life and art that inspire, scenes that thrill and make you laugh. We’d like to share some of these "collectors’ items" with you, and will showcase them on a regular basis in our version of a multiplex. So visit our theatres – the Raw Bar, Juke Box, Back Room, Pravda and Baby Grand – as we program everything from killer ants to singing fools.
"Repertory isn’t dead, it just needs a stage." – Phil Stein
Raw Bar - Stock footage that hasn’t been masticated to death to fit into McPrograms.
Juke Box - Memorable stock footage, from comedy to cartoons, sports, and disasters.
Back Room - Secrets of experimental, psychotronic and other pure cinema.
Pravda - Talking heads, ideas and other retro programming.
Baby Grand - An intimate stage for performers past and present.
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| "The Divine Horsemen" (excerpt) by Maya Deren | |  From the early 1940s until her sudden death in 1961, Maya Deren was a guiding light of the American avant-garde film movement. She worked completely outside the commercial film industry and made her own inner experience the centre of her films.
Though she made only seven films, Maya is credited as being the first dance filmmaker, someone who “made people both think and feel, and dared to give sense to its full meaning”. Her films explore the theoretical subjects of space, time, the nature of form, the psyche, the possibilities of cinematic manipulation and the magic of dance.
In 1946, Maya was the first filmmaker to receive a Guggenheim Fellowship (for work in creative motion pictures). She also wrote numerous theoretical and technical articles for film magazines and in 1946 published a pamphlet, “Anagram of Ideas on Art, Form and Film”.
Deren used her Guggenheim Fellowship to go to Haiti to film Voudoun (voodoo) ceremonies and dances. During this visit she became personally involved in the mysterious religion, which led to her writing The Divine Horsemen. Although not trained as an anthropologist, she did a painstaking ethnographic study and consulted at length with Joseph Campbell and Gregory Bateson on the book that became the definitive work of Haitian Voudoun.
In her Statement of Principles she wrote: “my films might be called poetic, choreographic, experimental. I am addressing myself not to any particular group, but to a special area and definite faculty in every or any man – to the part of him which creates myths, invents divinities, and ponders, for no practical purpose whatsoever, on the nature of things. The important truth is the poetic one”.
Maya died suddenly in 1961 of a strange seizure, or apoplectic fit, or cerebral haemorrhage, according to varying accounts.
Sheldon Rochlin was a student at New York University when he first met Deren and saw her films in 1960. He promptly dropped out of school to become a filmmaker. In tribute to her legacy, he restored the negatives of her films and converted them to video. These films were among the first to be distributed by Sheldon’s then-fledgling company, Mystic Fire Video.
The two volumes, Maya Deren: Experimental Films, and Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti, are available from Mystic Fire Video.
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| "Puja" (excerpt) by Morgan Harris | |  Morgan Harris’ experimental endeavour "Puja" takes you on a visual musical odyssey shot on location in six countries around the world. This film juxtaposes the ancient spiritual world of ritual, shamans and temples against a kinetic, urban landscape.
Morgan Harris is a filmmaker and musician. The son of Hilary Harris (film director, DP, academy award winner and time-lapse pioneer), Morgan has gone on to develop his own graphic, lyrical and abstract visual style. He also incorporates his talents with music into his projects, designing and composing the soundtrack to many of them. “Puja” is the result of one such meshing of Morgan’s visual and musical skills.
Morgan’s film projects range from music videos to documentaries and features. He has cinematography credits on projects involving Joseph Campbell, The Dalai Lama, Terence McKenna, The Beastie Boys and feature film "3000 Miles to Graceland" staring Kevin Costner. He is also VP of Mystic Fire Video, which specialises in experimental films.
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| "Illumination" (excerpt) by Ken Jenkins. Music by Iasos. | |  Now playing in the Back Room.
Ken Jenkins began working in visual music special effects in 1969. Starting with live projection shows, his art progressed into film and video. The first releases (in 1978) were the films "Beauty" and "Radiance-The Experience of Light" . Other videos that include Ken's work are "Shirley MacLaine's Inner Workout", "Journey Into Color", "Crystal Vista", "Summer Wind", "California Images", & "Harmony". Ken also continues to create live performances utilizing video projection.
While each image was created differently, most originate optically. They were generated using special effects projectors which are like highly modified slide projectors that have moving image wheels instead of slides. The resulting projections were recorded, and the best images were selected, modified, layered, and edited. One result of this editing process is that four to six layers of images are on the screen at any one time. "Illumination" was edited from more than 25 hours of 1" source tapes, over a five year period.
For more details write:
IMMEDIATE FUTURE PRODUCTIONS
P.O. Box 4404
San Rafael
CA 94913.
kenjenkins@aol.com
Or visit:
http://www.immediatefuture.com
For more of Iasos' music, visit:
http://www.iasos.com
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