Has Lepage really turned a page in art history?

[aplumpton]

<p>Using cinematographic techniques in art may not be new, but Robert Lepage's use of the medium, evident in his opera staging (most recently the Met performance in December of "La damnation de Faust"), his stimulating feature films, his experimental theatre, his work for "Cirque de Soleil" in Vegas, but more recently and more specifically, the 40 minute projection of photographs and video on a 2000 foot wide series of grain silos, may signal a new turning of the page in photographic art. Or perhaps it is simply video vaudeville.</p>

<p>To fuel your thoughts on this, here is a link to the work of his multimedia theatre/art company "Ex machina" and to his work known as "The Image Mill":</p>

<p>www.robertlepage.com</p>

<p>Hit the bar called "other projects" to bring up "The Image Mill" (the 40 minute projection (27 projectors + 330 loudspeakers) onto the cylindrical silos), where you can see the English language video clip in which Lepage describes his artistic approach, as well as a slideshow of some of the photographic and video collages presented in it during the summer of 2008.</p>

<p>I had a hard time taking my eyes off it during a number of the 2008 presentations. Is this the ultimate deployment of the photographic image?</p>

[jtk]

<p>Arthur, I agree that "Image Mill" seems of tremendous importance..and as I mentioned elsewhere, I'm excited and want to visit from New Mexico should it be produced again.</p>

<p>I don't think it really "turns a page." I managed part of a team that produced 32 projector (Kodak Ektagraphics with 46mm glass mounted slides) shows for Electrovision Productions, cc1970: San Francisco Experience, Hawaii Experience, NY Experience...the company, Media Generalists, went on to co-produce China Experience (for World's Fair) and the entire US Bicentennial slide show, which involved 81 slide projectors and a prototype IBM PC.</p>

<p>One of the most beautiful slide shows I've ever seen was produced by David Innocencio cc1980...David was a poetic multi-projector pioneer...a review of that year's San Francisco Ballet season...I watched it one of SF's enclosed Bay piers, sitting on the floor with 100 ballet dancers. Lots of joy, weeping etc. David also produced multi projector shows for many museum exhibits as well as annual corporate presentations.</p>

<p>Abel Gance's "Napoleon" was shot with three hand-cranked, synched motion picture cameras, then projected a few times with three synched projectors...before it was put into hibernation. Years later it was pulled out and restored with Francis Coppola's money and projected in SF Opera House with his father, Carmine Coppola, conducting an orchestra (ballet, opera, symphony? don't recall). I saw it in one of its first multi-projector presentations since 1924...it was staggering, virtual time travel. It's apparently even more wonderful now, with further restoration, but I doubt most of us will ever see it properly because of the necessary projector setup and the necessary live orchestra.</p>

<p>After I saw it, it went to Switzerland, where it was projected outdoors, massively on the wall of a building so the dying Abel Gance could view from his hotel bed. http://archive.sensesofcinema.com/contents/06/38/napoleon.html</p>

<p>Gance's Napoleon is of course cinema, but the slide shows I mentioned were ultimate still images...the ones I worked on were mostly duplicated up to 46mm (or down to it from tiny segments of 35mm) and mounted laboriously by 4 person teams in Wess pin-registered slide mounts.</p>

<p> </p>

[aplumpton]

<p>John, you are probably right that Lepage has not innovated in a new artistic realm, like offering a "new book" on art creation, but rather has "turned the page" by simply building upon the creations of those before him (including your own work). Mozart was a sensational and creative musician, although unlike some before him, he did not create new forms of music. As always, you have added some most interesting examples.</p>

<p>I think the above-mentioned interview with Lepage is interesting for those interested in both still and motion forms of photography, as he seems to me to be on the cutting edge of the medium (artistically as well as technically), and we, as lovers of the process of the capture of light, can benefit from the thoughts of those leading artists. I still can see in my mind his riveting images from the Quebec City Opera autumn productions of the short operas "Bluebeard's Castle" and "Enhwartung" (Schoenberg, no doubt misspelt here) - masterly and illusory projections of light and objects. Accompanying friends, not consistent opera lovers, were bowled over by the wonderful imagery.</p>

<p>Our local Quebec City mayor has promised to renew "The Image Mill" in 2009 or 2010. Hoipefully, that promise won't be 'derailed' by his recent fascination for and desire to create a Windsor (Detroit) - Toronto - Montreal - Quebec high speed TGV rail line, following his January visit to France and their TGV. Anyway, I will certainly let you and fellow PNetters know of a repeat Ex Machina projection, and stand in line for it!</p>

<p> </p>

[jtk]

<p>Sorry to blurt all that history, but there aren't too many other places where it'd be understood.</p>

<p>I'm confident, from what you've said and what that video shows, that you're right that he's created a breakthrough...sometimes quantitative (eg big and long and experentially deep) becomes qualitative ...and obviously a lot more than that was done by LePage.</p>

<p>Arthur, my "own work" was entirely studio/lab technical, save for a few panoramic photos (Brooks and some kind of Swiss 70mm 360deg camera)...over months of 12 hour days I supervised/operated an exquisitely good E4 lab dedicated to 35mm & 46mm, managed/operated several animation cameras, managed an ebbing-flowing team of merrily stoned hippies who assembled complex, sometimes hand-painted slides. Not art, not breakthrough...part of a bigger team and part of a maximum form. Video/digital makes all of that easier and brings infinitely more fluidity and potential... :-)</p>

[joe_jackson4]

<p>No.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.projecting.co.uk/ETC/Projects/Large_Public_Events/large_public_events.html">http://www.projecting.co.uk/ETC/Projects/Large_Public_Events/large_public_events.html</a></p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Paul, No dosn't mean very much if you haven't seen all these events, or those of Lepage (including The Image Mill). The ETC (European something or other?) events certainly look interesting, although many of them seem to be short (7 minutes at Edinburgh tatoo) or documentary, compared to artistic. Not having seen them, I guess it is difficult to compare. I would certainly reserve my No.</p>

<p>I suggest you see the site mentioned and Lepage's commentary. He used the cylindrical surfaces of each silo of the 2000 foot wide (and a few hundred foot high) array of silos, in order to have both illusory planar or revolving images that underwent various abstract and real transformations over the 40 minute projection (from 27 very high powered projectors and 323 loudspeakers for the original musical score), including movements horizontally and vertically over the mammoth "screen". It required anumber of years of his group to create. Several cities have requested of him a similar artistic production, but he has declined (an artist always moves on to new things). 8000 persons (on average) attended each evening of the two months and a half or showings, seven days a per week (all free of charge; I believe only one evening event was cancelled for torrential rain).</p>

[joe_jackson4]

<p>Arthur, ETC worked with Lepage on "<a href="http://www.projecting.co.uk/ETC/Projects/Large_Public_Events/New_World_record_For_Video_Pro/new_world_record_for_video_pro.html">The Image Mill</a> ". Those kind of presentations are their business...</p>

<p>Mr Lepage himself tells us that "The images are almost all drawn from archives dating back to the time when Samuel de Champlain drew Québec", and it appears that someone else did the music. With that in mind, I can't give Mr Lepage a great deal of credit for the content, I'm afraid. I'm sure it's an enjoyable enough spectacle, but then again so are firework displays... :)</p>

<p>Is it "art"...? Is it "important"...? Sure, if you want it to be... :)</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Paul, the archives contain images that Lepage has manipulated artistically in his presentation. Not many date back to 1599-1635 (made during Champlain's 19 trips to North America). Most are visual elements that Lepage and ExMachina have put together in ananalogous manner to artists who create collages. My impression (I saw it 5 times with European and American visitors) is that many of the images used in the "montages" were created by Lepage, or his team. They are as much cinematographic as still images and mutate and inter-relate as his story unfolds.</p>

<p>A priori, I couldn't care less if it is art or not. I think it is. </p>

<p>Maybe if you actually witnessed it, you might think so, too. </p>

<p>Let me simply state that it is unquestionably powerful, not documentary in the usual sense, and equally as much a communication of aesthetics and feeling for me as my favourite images of other more well-known artists of the 20th and 21st centuries.</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>With all my respect for the technicians who produce fireworks displays and the simpler "Son et Lumière" presentations, they are clearly not art and mostly boring to the mind. </p>

[jtk]

<p>Shakespeare's historic plays were based on somebody else's "original content." The original content appears to be specific books owned by one of his publishers.</p>

<p>Ansel Adams shot no "original content," the mountains were put there by somebody else. Hernandez, New Mexico, its graveyard and moon, are still there. They were appropriated by Mr. Adams, not "original."</p>

<p> Wagner just recounted the "original content" of German legends...and somebody else sang the words... W didn't even play the music!</p>

<p>The Four Gospels are one man's tale...Matthew, Luke, and John photocopied and rearranged Mark's "original content."</p>

<p>LePage creates "original content" the way Francis Coppola created The Godfather's "original content." Coppola didn't play the soundtrack on his harmonica.</p>

<p>It's surprising to have to have to mention such fundamental realities here.</p>

[kristina_kraft]

<p><strong>Holy smoke,</strong> Arthur!<br>

That is a real gigantic performance. This is my first news about Lepage and I like what he did - a great tribute to Quebec city. The amazing part is how the pictures were rolling on cylindrical silos. I'm not sure if they managed some new technology for these particular sequences. I couldn't understand so smoothly the interview.<br>

The music seems to imitate the noise of the mill. Together, for me it is one big audio-visual chaos that has a sense and purpose.<br>

It looks like it is an ultimate deployment of photographic image, turning a page <em>further</em> .</p>

 

[joe_jackson4]

<p>"A priori, I couldn't care less if it is art or not. I think it is."</p>

<p>Well, Arthur, I think it's a bunch of archive pics projected onto a big ugly building in Quebec. As such, I guess it may be of some value as a little light entertainment after a few beers... :)</p>

<p>"Maybe if you actually witnessed it, you might think so, too."</p>

<p>Given the links, information and description you've provided, I suspect it wouldn't be to my taste on an "artistic" level...</p>

<p>Well, good old art'n'taste is a purely personal thing, of course... For example, I much prefer my writing to that of Shakespeare, my music to that of Wagner, my movies to those of Coppola, my photographs to those of Ansel Adams, and my drawings to those of Picasso.</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Tch tch, Paul, you are a man wed to paradigms.</p>

<p>Do you have an axe to grind with French-Canadian or Canadian artists? I have trouble understanding your viewpoint, unless it may be the good old "British is Best, by Jingo" (a dinosaur attitude I occasionally was forced to amusingly tolerate while studying years ago in old Blighty). </p>

<p>Many of the artists you mention, and those you may actually like, were often not accepted by the public at the start. However, at least those who then objected to them had the sense to at the very least read, see or hear their "pretentious" or "superficial" art with their own eyes, rather than depend upon second opinions or secondary technical details.</p>

<p>Some architects see grain silos as representing considerable beauty in architecture (at least a departure from cookie-cutter rennaisance design that held Europe and America prisoner for several centuries), and Lepage has turned those "ugly" silos, quite magically, into cinematographic visual art. Somewhat like Cristo, who wraps over-embellished renaissance structures to show what is of the more elemental and meaningful beauty. </p>

<p>You are a critic without something to criticise (except second hand information), and thereby (as far as I am concerned) you condemn your own remarks on that basis. </p>

<p>Jean Sibelius once rather perceptively remarked: "No statue has ever been put up to a critic." </p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Hi Kristina,</p>

<p>The cylindrical imagery is neat, as he uses the individual rotating silos to change the overall scene (composite of the many silos), sometimes to allow mutation into other forms (sometimes with elements moving independently of others, left and right across the "stage"). The music (I forget the mame of the local composer) mimics the sounds of the mill, or glass stained glass windows breaking (Quebec has seen several battles in 400 years, not unlike your own home country), and other evocative sounds, but the musical score is quite varied. In some sequences (on one of the building sides, within the series of silos) he has historical personnages appearing in part or in fragments, in varying frames and with or without elements of flags (British, French, Scottish, Welsh, Italian, etc., representative of the immigrants), also various statues have been photographed and mutate physically (on video) from one to the other, in symbolism of the many innovators, artists and leaders of this rather beautiful UNESCO designated city.</p>

<p>This of course is but a fraction of the organised chaos that Lepage has created, perhaps not too dissimilar to his approach to his English (Royal Vic or Royal Shakespeare theatres), French (Paris Opera), Las Vegas (Cirque de Soleil) or New York (Met, Opera) presentations, which hint a cinematographers approach. As a graduate of scenography and design, you would probably also enjoy his full length feature films (Possible Worlds, The Hidden Face of the Moon, The Confession, others). His order book is apparently full for many years into the future.</p>

<p>Hopefully, Quebec City's mayor will succeed in having a re-run of "Le Moulin à Images" next year, if local residents agree (it is a bit of an imposition on them each evening, in 2008 over 2 and 1/2 months) </p>

<p> </p>

[joe_jackson4]

<p>"Do you have an axe to grind with French-Canadian or Canadian artists?"</p>

<p>No, not at all.</p>

<p>"However, at least those who then objected to them had the sense to at the very least read, see or hear their "pretentious" or "superficial" art with their own eyes, rather than depend upon second opinions or secondary technical details."</p>

<p>Arthur, you asked "Has Lepage really turned a page in art history?", and posted a link to a web site in your original post. Given that you failed to provide free plane tickets and a time machine, on what basis should I/we answer your question, hmm...? :) My honest answer/opinion is still "no", BTW.... :)</p>

<p>Are you even interested in honest answers to your question, Arthur? I do hope so, otherwise I'll be tempted to dismiss this topic as some kind of bizarre, highly-defensive PR spiel on behalf of Mr Lepage.</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Paul, this discussion with you isn't going anywhere. You insist on making a categoric criticism of something you haven't seen or bothered to study via the website I mentioned. That's your business, of course, as a self-described "honest" evaluator.</p>

<p>I look forward to learning from any further comments of PhotoNetters who may have actually seen the presentation, or have at least bothered to study the available albeit limited information on the work, via the same Ex Machina website.</p>

[joe_jackson4]

<p>Arthur, we just saw the whole thing on Youtube:</p>

<p><a href="

<p>Visually, it was much very much as I expected, TBH... It was clearly trying awfully hard to be "arty" (in a rather familiar "graphic designer's fridge pics" kinda way...) but ultimately came across as confused, unsatisfying and generally rather dull. In that sense I think it was quite typical of these sort of presentations.</p>

<p>Oh, and we thought the sound/music was extremely irritating.</p>

[aplumpton]

<p><!--StartFragment--></p>

<p >Paul, I could only take a bit less than 4 minutes of that really terrible recording. </p>

<p > </p>

<p >Extremely dark, terrible sound quality, no image definition whatsoever. You see so little and what you see is a dirty video camera lens. Absolutely no details of the apresentation showed through, where there wer light areas he (or she) filmed dark. The cameraman must have been into the bottle, as the camera was going all over the place. It would make any point and shooter with a 5 minute course in photography vomit involuntarily!</p>

<p > </p>

<p >You can do better than that for a review, I sincerely hope. Here is another infinitely better filmed one, which misses a lot of the best parts (it is only 10 of the 40 or so minutes), but at least it is reasonable photography (Although the sound is not well captured, dur to the distant location). You may have to go through an initial U Tube ad in French before it starts.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >www.tagtele.com/videos/voir/22815</p>

<!--EndFragment-->

 

[joe_jackson4]

<p>Arthur, yeah, the video quality was typical Youtube fare, which is largely shite, of course... Still, it was the subject matter that I was concerned with, not the quality of the recording.</p>

<p>That tagetele link isn't working for me... But yeah, I'll try it again some other time, so I can see the naff "graphic designer's fridge pics" projector show thingy a tad more clearly... :)</p>

[kristina_kraft]

<p>Arthur,<br>

this Tagtele video stream is very good. Now I understand better. Seems less chaotic.<br>

I was reading about his other works. I wish I could see these movies. "Possible Worlds" seems very interesting from what I've read. There is almost nothing unfamiliar to me, inside. Then, "Far side of the moon", also, nothing unfamiliar to me. I'm really interesting how Lapage managed to express those truths that I also look for. And "The Confessions" seems to me very intrigued. I'd love to see this movie where past and present live together. It's just perfect, but unfortunately, these events end tragically. In a real life, I suppose, would lead to tragedy. Tell me if I'm wrong.<br>

I recommend you to watch "Dogville" movie. Film-makers made a kind of inovation. The plot is placed inside of a real studio as a theatrical stage. Dogville is a village where the main actress Nicole Kidman hid herself from her father. From that point it starts very interesting play of how villagers had behaved upon her. It's terrified, it's awesome.</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Kristina and Paul,</p>

<p>Thanks for your comments. No doubt I am happy that a local artist and his group are trying to push the boundaries of art a little further, even with the vehicle of a popular celebration event like the work in question. Unfortunately the Tagtele YouTube video, effective except for the sound, has edited out some of the more interesting compositions of the 40 minute presentation. The filmer has preferred some of the presentation related to the history of a local large cigarette manufacturer, a pigment and paint company, the abortive visit of the Queen to a Quebec in full political transition (The so-called "Quiet Revolution") and the less artistic display of flags or ships and planes (and, Paul will be glad to see, fireworks). The more artistic images and content are omitted in the YouTube video, but at least the thrust of the presentation comes through.</p>

<p>Kristina, it has been too long (a decade) since I saw "Possible Worlds" and I will have to Google that and the others to better remember their content, but one thing that always impressed me about Lepage is that he does not seem to be following any particular trend, only his own imagination (yes, many of the cinematographic methods have been around before, but elsewhere, the presence of Haydn and the symphony structure didn't thwart the imagination of a Mozart or a Beethoven, or Schubert, etc.). But I will re-familiarise myself with his films, and his work with the Noh Theatre in Japan.</p>

<p>I love the cinema of Lars Von Triar (the Danish cinematographer, did I get his name right?). "Dogville" is magnificent for its ominpresent human psychology reasons you mention and I'm sure that his unique approach has not been lost on other workers like Lepage. His stagings last year of Quebec Opera's "Barbe Bleu" and a Schoenberg short opera ("Enweirhtung?") were stark, but powerful and beautiful, although I think he overdid a little the Berlioz "Damnation of Faust" (too cinematographic) from the New York Met in December (which we see in real time at local cinemas by HD video).</p>

<p>Von Triar's other great films include "Europa" (absolutely arresting!) and "Dancer in the Dark". Did you see either?</p>

<p>My feeling is that "repertory" cinema (as opposed to Hollywoodian and other mainstream) from various countries, more than still photography, is one of the best ways in the global world to get an insight into the minds and preoccupations of various national groups and cultures (like "Babette's Feast" did in a folksy way, albeit for long ago late 19th century rural Denmark). Perhaps Alain De Botton should include such films in a re-issue of his recent book on the culture and "Art of Travel". Think of the impact of the Iranian and Afghanistan films, or those from Australia, Japan and China, to name but a few.</p>

[jtk]

<p>"Still, it was the subject matter that I was concerned with, not the quality of the recording."</p>

<p>Seems to me that in a Philosophy of Photography context, subject matter is far less important than quality of presentation...</p>

<p>Photography's ultimate purpose is presentation, after all. If it was subject matter, we'd be satisfied with subtly lit snaps of drawer handles, broken crockery, and stuff retrieved from personal archives (in my case).</p>

<p> </p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>"subject matter is far less important than quality of presentation..."</p>

<p>I think in the context of some things being said here, this is an important reminder. </p>

<p>I wouldn't go as far as John, however. For me, it's not a matter of subject matter being far less important, it's a matter of subject matter and presentation being symbiotic. A photo IS it's subject matter presented (even an abstract is a presentation of something, if only design). Subject matter will often guide the various techniques and tools employed by the photographer. The reverse is true as well. In exploring a particular technique, some subjects may lend themselves better to that exploration. Of course I know it is I who am making the technical choices, but those choices are influenced by my subject at the time and, as a viewer, I often won't fully "get" the presentation if I don't see it as intimately tied to the subject.</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Ooops! The film "The Confession" is really "The Confessional", which together with the later "The Polygraph" relate to both Hitchcock's film with Montgomery Cliff and LePage's youth and some tragic events at his art college.</p>

<p>The Confessional is summarily reported in Wikipedia:<br>

</p>

<p ><em><strong>The Confessional</strong></em> (<a title="French language" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_language">French</a>: <em><strong>Le Confessionnal</strong></em>) is a <a title="1994" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994">1994</a> mystery / <a title="Drama film" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama_film">drama film</a> directed by <a title="Robert Lepage" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Lepage">Robert Lepage</a>.</p>

<p >The film is set in <a title="Quebec City" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quebec_City">Quebec City</a>, in two distinct time periods. In the present day, Pierre Lamontagne (<a title="Lothaire Bluteau" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lothaire_Bluteau">Lothaire Bluteau</a>) searches for his brother Marc (<a title="Pierre Goyette (page does not exist)" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Pierre_Goyette&action=edit&redlink=1">Pierre Goyette</a>) to help unravel a family mystery. The mystery itself unfolds in flashbacks set against the backdrop of <a title="Alfred Hitchcock" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Hitchcock">Alfred Hitchcock</a>'s <a title="1952" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1952">1952</a> filming of <em><a title="I Confess (film)" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Confess_(film)">I Confess</a></em> in the city.</p>

<p >The cast also includes <a title="Ron Burrage (page does not exist)" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ron_Burrage&action=edit&redlink=1">Ron Burrage</a> as Hitchcock, <a title="Kristin Scott Thomas" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kristin_Scott_Thomas">Kristin Scott Thomas</a> as his assistant, and <a title="Jean-Louis Millette (page does not exist)" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jean-Louis_Millette&action=edit&redlink=1">Jean-Louis Millette</a> as Raymond Massicotte, Marc's lover who also holds the key to unlocking the Lamontagne family's secrets.</p>

<p ><em>The Confessional</em> won the <a title="Genie Award for Best Canadian Film" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genie_Award_for_Best_Canadian_Film">Genie Award for Best Canadian Film</a> of 1996.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >A more in-depth review of the film and a critique of its cinematographic impact (for and against) was published in the Globe and Mail in 97.</p>

 

[jtk]

<p>"For me, it's not a matter of subject matter being far less important, it's a matter of subject matter and presentation being symbiotic." - Fred G</p>

<p>Whereas...I almost invariably value presentation first, then subject. Of the many Lincoln portraits floating around today, I'm drawn to those that evoke emotion...which I take to be more a matter of the photographer's skill than multiple Lincolns.</p>