The Dante Quartet

Stan Brakhage

Stan Brakhage was born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1933. He spent his adolescent years with his adoptive mother in Denver, Colorado, where he began directing films. In 1952 he shot his first film, Interim, and then in 1959, after having lived in New York, San Francisco and Princeton, he returned to Colorado and settled down with his family in the Rockies. During the 1960's his films, which were initially influenced by Italian neorealism, abandoned the narrative form and became experiments and subjective visions which resemble abstract expressionism, making Brakhage one of the symbols of the New American Cinema and independent cinema. Many of his films deal with his family and the Colorado landscape (Window Water Baby Moving, 1959; 23^rd Psalm Branch, 1966-67), while works like Mothlight (1963), The Art of Vision (1961-65) and Fire of Waters (1965) study the relationship between light, color and natural elements (water, fire, vegetation, stone) with lyrical and abstract images overlapping rapid glimpses of human forms. He taught History of Cinema at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1969 and then taught at the University of Colorado at Boulder from 1981 to 2002. From the 1970's until the end of his career, Brakhage continued his 1960's experimentations, creating a vast filmography that includes abstract films that are generally mute, lasting from just a few seconds to many hours, which were organized into series (The Romans Funeral Series, 1979-80; Babylon Series, 1989-90; The Persian Series, 1999-2000). These shorts were filmed in various formats (Super8, 16mm, 35mm, Cinemascope, Imax) using every technique and expressive form, including the most manual and material ones (scratching the film, painting onto the film by hand), photographic cinema and visual collages. Brakhage made almost 400 films, has written numerous books (including Metaphor of Vision, 1964), and was influenced by the works of directors, painters, poets and musicians. He has promoted and collaborated on the productions of many of his students. During the 1990's he shot and developed the technique known as hand-painting (painting applied directly onto the single frames), which he experimented for the first time in Dog Star Man (1961-64) and completed his final works, Stan's Window, 2003, and Chinese Series, 2003 in his house in Victoria, Canada, where he moved in 2002 with his wife Marilyn, and where he died in March of this year.

FILMOGRAFIA

Interim (cm, 1952), Desistfilm (cm, 1954), Reflections on Black (cm, 1955), The Wonder Ring (cm, 1955), Gnir Rednow (cm, 1955-56, co-regia Joseph Cornell), Centuries of June (cm, 1955-1956, co-regia Joseph Cornell), Anticipation of the Night (mm, 1958), Window Water Baby Moving (cm, 1959), The Dead (cm, 1960), Mothlight (cm, 1963), Dog Star Man (1961-64), The Art of Vision (1961-65), Fire of Waters (cm, 1965), Songs (1964-69), Eye Myth (cm, 1967), Scenes From Under Childhood (1967-70), The Weir-Falcon Saga (cm, 1970), The Machine of Eden (cm, 1970), The Animals of Eden and After (mm, 1970), 'The Pittsburgh Trilogy', Eyes (mm, 1971), Deus Ex (mm, 1971), The Act of Seeing of One Man's Eye (mm, 1971), Sexual Meditations (1970-72), The Riddle of Lumen (cm, 1972), The Wold-Shadow (1972), The Text of Light (1974), The Stars Are Beautiful (cm, 1974), Short Films (1975), Super 8 Short Films (cm, 1976), Tragoedia (mm, 1976), Soldiers and Other Cosmic Objects (cm, 1977), Nightmare Series (cm, 1978), Creation (cm, 1979), Sincerity (5 film, 1973-80), Duplicity (3 film, 1978-80), Romans o The Romans Funeral Series (1979-80), Murder Psalm (cm, 1980), The Garden of Earthly Delights (cm, 1981), Nodes (cm, 1981), RR (cm, 1981), Unconscious London Strata (cm, 1981), Arabics o Arabic Numeral Series (1980-82), EgyptianSeries (cm, 1984), Torturede Dust (1984), Caswallon Trilogy (cm, 1986), The Loom (mm, 1986), The Dante Quartet (cm, 1987), Kindering (cm, 1987), I' Dreaming (cm, 1988), Marilyn's Window (cm, 1988), Rage Net (cm, 1988), Faustfilm Series 1-4 (4 film, 1987-89), Visions in Meditation Series #1-4 (4 film, 1989-90), Babylon Series (1989-90), City Streaming (cm, 1990), Passage Through: A Ritual (mm, 1990), Agnus Dei Kinder Synapse (cm, 1991), A Child's Garden and the Serious Sea (1991), Christ Mass Sex Dance (cm, 1991), Delicacies of Molten Horror Synapse cm, 1991), Crack Glass Eulogy (cm, 1992), Interpolation 1-V (1992), Untitled (For Marilyn) (cm, 1992), Boulder Blues and Pearls and' (cm, 1993), Ephemeral Solidity (cm, 1993), The Harrowing and Tryst Haunt (cm, 1993), Stellar (cm, 1993), Chartres Series (cm, 1994), Elementary Phrases (mm, 1994, co-regia Phil Solomon), First Hymn to the Night ' Novalis (cm, 1994), The Mammals of Victoria (cm, 1994), Trilogy (cm, 1995), The 'b' Series (cm, 1995), The Lost Films (mm, 1995), ...Preludes (1995-96), Concrescence (1996, co-regia Phil Solomon), Commingled Containers (cm, 1996), The Cat on the Worm's Green Realm (cm, 1997), Last Hymn to the Night ' Novalis (1997), Divertimento (cm, 1997), Self Song/Death Song (cm, 1997), Yggdrasill Whose Roots Are Stars in the Human Mind (1997), '...' (ellipses), (1998), Coupling (cm, 1999), Stately Mansions Did Decree (1999), The Persian Series (1999-2000), The God of Day Had Gone Down Upon Him (mm, 2000), Jesus Trilogy and Coda (cm, 2000), Garden Path (cm, 2001, co-regia Mary Beth Reed), Micro Garden )cm, 2001), Night Mulch and Very (cm, 2001), Occam's Thread (cm, 2001), Lovesongs (2001-2002), Ascension (cm, 2002), Resurrectus Est (cm, 2002), Seasons' (cm, 2002, co-regia Phil Solomon), Panels for the Walls of Heaven (mm, 2002), Stan's Window and Work in Progress (cm, 2003), Chinese Series (2003).