composition, conference, concept

This week there’s three things on my agenda:

On october 8, 9 and 10 I’ll give a three-day workshop at the masters programme Animation at the St. Lukas art institute in Brussels. The topic of the workshop is abstract animation and methods for composing the non-narrative aspects of animation. As preparation of a project later this year, they asked to me to talk about the ‘Poème Electronique”; the practical part of the workshop will consist of developing an animatic on the basis of its soundtrack by Edgar Varèse.

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one sheet of the ‘minutage’ of the “Poème Électronique”.

On october 12 I’ll be talking at a conference in Gent in a side-programme of the Film Festival Ghent devoted to the themes of “Immersion – The Art of True Illusion” and “The Cinematic Experience: from photographic storytelling to audio-visual composition”. My talk is called “The Mechanization of the Magical Sign”, and it will deal with the continuity I see between the preoccupations of early abstract artists, a certain number of experimental filmmakers and media artists, and recent scientific enterprises such as artificial chemistry and artificial life. I’m currently writing an essay on the subject, which will be published in the book connected to this conference, the Cimatics festival and the Sonic Acts festival.

Also on october 12 will be the opening of the Zoo Art Fair at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. My tiny contribution consists of my first conceptual art piece as part of the “Instructions for Films” project by no.w.here.