MICRO
(Friday September 17th, 24th & October 1st, 2021)
Hello and welcome to Citric Signal Video Network’s second open call, a mode-spanning exploration of the theme “Micro.”
When deciding on our second prompt, we wanted to choose a topic that left things open-ended and our submissions for this call did not disappoint! We received a wide variety of fascinating film and video work, in many different forms.
In preparing this show we realized two things: we have films that tackle massive topics on a micro scale, and films that take the miniscule and paint it as massive. This first approach is most evident in our opening film The Solar System (In Luncheon Meat), a playful recreation of our solar system using deli meats, as the title suggests. Films like Double Whammy take on the topic of Mental Health by giving us the smallest of peeks into its filmmaker’s life navigating bipolar disorder. Vive Google Maps, Vive L’Amour provides a shot-by-shot recreation of a single scene from Tsai Ming Liang’s Vive L’Amour, using only Google Maps.
Giving the miniscule big-picture treatment are films like Stars of the Lid, which creates an enormous city from the smallest of objects, and Zombi Zapping, which uses the fluttering, frozen moments of paused cable television feeds to construct an entirely new story. We end the show with “Silêncio por favor” (Please silence), a video of small moments carrying weight far beyond their surface appearance.
One of the most important things for us here at CSVN is to illustrate the vast diversity of what experimental film and video can be. We hope that our second show reflects that approach and encourages viewers to pick up a camera, a pen, or whatever they have and make some weird movies.
We hope you find this “micro” program as mesmerizing as we do!
Natasha Cantwell
The Solar System
Synopsis
Inspired by 1970s educational videos and craft books, this silent 16mm film imagines the planets in our solar system on a more fathomable scale.
Social Media
website: http://www.natashacantwell.com
instagram: @natasha.cantwell
Tristen Ives
Double Whammy
Synopsis
A diaristic short exploring mental illness and identity.
Social Media
Tridisha Goswami
Watermelon Canned Juice
Synopsis
A woman treads on a vague path of reality and dream
Social Media
Instagram: @goswamitridisha
Patrick Tarrant
How To Microwave A Cauliflower
Synopsis
First film the cauliflower three times, with red, green and blue filter in turn. After 30 seconds make sure to pull focus on two of these takes, but not the third. Shooting should be done through a spinning aperture for no more than 90 seconds. Combine in a computer.
Social Media
Alessia Cecchet and Joshua DeanTutthill
Big{foot} Love
Synopsis
A forest, a hunter, a groan.
Social Media
website: joshuadeantuthill.com/big-foot-love
instagram: @bigfootloveanimation
Kim Collmer
Stars of the Lid
Synopsis
Stars of the Lid is a microcosmic universe made up of spheres, reflections, and glittering lights. The focal point of this film shifts between subatomic particles and the grandeur of the sparkling lights of an imagined city. Inside is a fluid space sculpted by light and existing within an absence of realistic scale. Instead, the scale of the space is in constant motion, malleable and fluid. An exploration of reflective materials and constructing space, this film is somewhat like looking through various microscopes. The material of light is used as an animating life force. The sound design for the video is created from manipulated early analog keyboards and sampled electronic sounds from the 70s and 80s. These sounds attempt to sonically convey the formation and dissolution of space. From tight tin-like punches to dense hums, these sonic vibrations bring into focus the environmental sounds lurking around us every day.
Social Media
website: kimcollmer.com
instagram: @kimcollmer
Luca Sorgato
Zombi Zapping
Synopsis
This film is a medley of ten TV networks. A lame, inconclusive zapping in which the characters, similar to zombies, appear trapped in an eternal loop.
Social Media
instagram: @urca_sgolato
Jack Wormell
Short Report
Synopsis
Short Report is a very small explanation of itself. Shot in Barcelona.
Artist Bio
instagram: @jackwormell
Pouria Kazemi
Leanne in the Lake
Synopsis
An experimental documentary about floating in the lake district in Manchester, UK.
Social Media
website: http://www.pouriakazemi.com
Lucas Rebelo
1 – Neblina
Synopsis
First episode of the new “Cartões Postais” webseries (transl.: Postcards), where I animate a panoramic photo
Social Media
website: luqalbuq.tumblr.com
youtube link
Leah Sandler
A Storm Is Coming (Death Cloud Manifesto)
Synopsis
In A Storm is Coming (Death Cloud Manifesto), a storybook-like narration borrowing language from western canon poetry describes a post-anthropocene landscape in the moments before a storm. The animation pieces together drawings of Florida-native flora and fauna made with handmade lampblack inks into a constructed nature scene of hand-cut paper, and photographs of the Florida sky. This is one iteration of the artist’s continued attempts to reimagine what a post-anthropocene history might look like.
Social Media
Francisco Rojas
A Heap of Broken Images
Synopsis
Sunday afternoon.
Images of last summer.
A view of the sunset from a hill.
Some flashes.
Social Media
instagram: @dogstarfran
Katina Bitsicas and Wilson Minshall
Eye Thorn Forrest
Synopsis
Eye Thorn Forrest repositions disintegrating traces of mushroom foraging memories across visual-aural lines. Sampling manipulated footage of eye surgery from past foraging mishaps and videos of forest walks, metaphorically connects the spontaneous appearance of memories with physical growths occurring beyond the reaches of the eye. Audio from mushroom walks dissolve through granular sample manipulation techniques, sounding the imperfect but persistent growth patterns of both mycelia and memory.
Social Media
Katina Bitsicas: @katinabitsicas | http://www.katinabitsicas.com
Wilson Minshall: @wilsonminshall | http://www.wilsonminshallart.com
Leevi Ikonen
I Dream of Legos
Synopsis
I Dream of Legos is an abstract portrayal of the late stages of Alzheimer’s disease, visualized with hand-drawn animations and distorted VHS tapes.
Social Media
Warsame Isse
Reer Guuraa
Synopsis
Reer Guuraa is an Afrosurrealist short film that centers on my father’s thoughts while migrating. A soundscape of distorted Morse code and footage of dried water droplets are used to create an abstract audiovisual archive. This archive is meant to depict my father’s emotions literal journey to find a home.
Social Media
instagram: @new_age_n0mad
Johann Calderón
Silver
Synopsis
Silver is a non-narrative abstract short video.
The major thoughts that flowed in for the visualization, is the idea of a flicker of electrical discharges and a gloomy representation of a nocturnal bombing.
The video is inspired by the poem Silver by Walter de la Mare and a dark interpretation of it.
Social Media
instagram: @Johann.calderon19
webpage: http://www.johanncalderon.com
Guido Devadder
Status Quontinuum
Synopsis
‘Status Quontinuum’ contemplates the inner struggle of mankind, much akin to Schopenhauer’s Will: the ceaseless, restless striving for satisfaction turning around in circles ad nauseam. This zoetrope/phenakistiscope animation is based on an extremely detailled 3D-print, captured with a 1970’s macro lens.
Social Media
instagram: @guido_devadder
vimeo link
Hsin-Yu Chen
Vive Google Maps, Vive L’Amour
Synopsis
By juxtaposing a walking sequence from Taiwanese director Tsai Ming-Liang’s Vive L’Amour (1994) with a real-time recreation on a similar walk following Google Maps, the video explores our perception of space, traces of collective memories, and the impact of documentation of different temporality presented as framed moving images.
Social Media
instagram: @hsin.y.chen
Yan Nicolas São Thiago
Silêncio Por Favor
Synopsis
I just want to rest a little, but this noise outside and inside won’t let me rest, silence, please…
Social Media
instagram: @yansaothiago
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