Making Images Move reveals a new history of cinema by uncovering its connections to other media and art forms. In this richly illustrated volume, Gregory Zinman explores how moving-image artists who worked in experimental film pushed the medium toward abstraction through a number of unconventional filmmaking practices, including painting and scratching directly on the film strip; deteriorating film with water, dirt, and bleach; and applying materials such as paper and glue. This book provides a comprehensive history of this tradition of “handmade cinema” from the early twentieth century to the present, opening up new conversations about the production, meaning, and significance of the moving image. From painted film to kinetic art, and from psychedelic light shows to video synthesis, Gregory Zinman recovers the range of forms, tools, and intentions that make up cinema’s shadow history, deepening awareness of the intersection of art and media in the twentieth century, and anticipating what is to come.
Gregory Zinman is Assistant Professor of Film and Media in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at the Georgia Institute of Technology and is a coeditor, with John Hanhardt and Edith Decker-Phillips, of We Are in Open Circuits: Writings by Nam June Paik.
List of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsIntroductionA Shadow History of the Moving ImagePART I. HANDMADE FILM1. Between Canvas and CelluloidVisual Music, Motion Paintings, and Cameraless Photography2. Abstractions in TimePainting and Scratching on Film3. By Chemical, by Body, by MechanismOther Handmade Methods4. Beyond the FrameCameraless Questions of Politics and Representation PART II. HANDMADE MOVING IMAGES5. Light in MotionThe Moving Image between the Plastic Arts and Cinema6. Making Space, Making TimeLight Art of the 1950s and 1960s7. Forms of RadianceThe Practice and Significance of the Psychedelic Light Show8. Video ArtAnalog Circuit Palettes, Cathode Ray CanvasesConclusionHandmade Moving Images in the Digital Era NotesIndex
"Written with careful precision and breadth. . . chronicling a rich, 100-year history of handmade moviemaking in which artists similarly trespass into other areas of creative practice."