In a way I did the opposite of what she did, her
tension was created in the performance and
act itself, whereas with my film, tension was
created through the camera speed and editing.
I started to shoot with Super 8mm only after
I graduated from film school. While at school,
we shot with 16mm, we dreamt of one day
shooting with 35mm. My 35mm dream was
later realised in short fiction films. But Super 8mm was great because, at the time,
the late 90s and early 2000s, it was cheap,
user-friendly and accessible. Plus, I always thought that some Super 8mm cameras aesthetically speaking, were beautiful as objects (Nizo, Beaulieu and Leicina).
Knife
For Knife, (16mm, black and
white, sound. 2009) .I was inspired by Marina Abramović’s
performance piece « Rhythm
10 » where she used a series
of 20 knives to quickly stab at
the spaces between her outstretched fingers. A tape-recorder was used as guide to
repeat the same movements.
In my film, using available light
and 16mm black and white film,
the gesture of the knife rhythmically falling between each finger
is re-enacted through different
camera speeds and elliptical editing. The music was later « composed » in a controlled manner:
watching the film and performing/
playing music simultaneously.
Super 8 mm film is a
wonderful but limited
medium. To take most
advantage of it, one
must understand, accept and work within its
limitations. I always exercise in-camera edits.