Introduced by Federico Rossin
In the 1970s, as the "structural" movement was deconstructing the entire cinematographic apparatus, imposing an experimental cinema that was at times a bit arid, cerebral and cold, Vincent Grenier proposed instead a "gentle deconstruction", a highly personal and rigorous visual research. In his first films made over the course of more than ten years (1975-1987), Grenier articulated questions essential to cinema: what is light? What is shadow? What is a frame? How does focus work? How does the mechanical eye see compared to the human eye? How do we distinguish colors and shapes? How is the three-dimensionality of the moving image created? Film after film, Grenier reinvents the foundations of the Seventh Art, first freeing the viewer from photographic realism, then from the temptations of fiction, embodiment and psychology, and finally from mythopoetic romanticism (following in Brakhage's footsteps, Grenier surpasses him in rigour and radicalism). Grenier's early works keep the viewer in a state of childlike discovery of the world, in a constant and productive tension between a pure sensation of form and a moving rediscovery of sight. A phenomenological, philosophical cinema, it is also playful. Vincent Grenier has been an inspiration to many young filmmakers, and his early films are exemplary of the freshness, purity and monastic simplicity of his work that cannot fail to move us again and again.
In this program, going beyond a simple chronology, we have tried to arrange Vincent Grenier's early films into a unified, fluid sequence of motifs, textures and forms. Seen one after the other, the films begin to intertwine and coalesce, all the while examining the question of sight, only to arrive at an 'almost' documentary image in the final film. An apprenticeship and an emancipation.
– Federico Rossin
Program:
- LIGHT SHAFT (1975 / 16mm > DCP / b&w / silent / 6' 21)
- INTÉRIEUR INTERIORS (TO AK) (1978 / 16mm > DCP / b&w / silent / 15' 00)
- WHILE REVOLVED (1976 / 16mm > DCP / color / silent / 9' 00)
- WORLD IN FOCUS (1976 / 16mm > DCP / color / silent / 16' 00)
- SHADE (1975 / 16mm > DCP / color / silent / 8' 45)
- CLOSER OUTSIDE (1981-1982 / 16mm > DCP / color / silent / 10' 00)
- TIME'S WAKE (ONCE REMOVED) (1987 / 16mm / col-b&w / silent / 12' 00)
https://lightcone.org/en/news-872-pour-vincent-grenier-ou-l-enfance-de-l...
Tickets : https://www.luminor-hoteldeville.com/reserver/F612466/D1727202600/VO/253664/