The Open Frame

In spite of claims of its obsolescence, analog film is still alive. It continues to exist as an inimitable artistic medium, put to use in myriad forms around the world. Nonetheless, in the context of our ever-expanding digital landscape, analog film faces new challenges that have forced it into a process of deep transformation. What steps do we need to take to guarantee that analog film will remain as a living-breathing medium? What are the alternatives to the idea of film as an obsolete, historical object? What new forms will film take and what will that mean for the culture that surrounds it? How do we keep analog film in the Now?

Organised by LaborBerlin in cooperation with the Film Institute of the Berlin University of the Arts, FILM IN THE PRESENT TENSE will bring together filmmakers, artists, programmers, technicians and representatives from museums, independent film labs and cinemas to address these questions and formulate ideas, possibilities and plans of action for keeping film current and alive. In addition to six panel discussions, there will be screenings and expanded cinema performances presenting some of the ways in which film continues to exist “in the present tense”.

THE OPEN FRAME

The basic elements of projection have always been constructs, historically at the mercy of subjective propriety and commercial interests. Still, the live manipulation of analog projection has provided artists over many decades with an opportunity to push beyond the physical limits of the traditional frame and the commercial screen. In expanded cinema, the frame, screen and theater are just few of the elements that artists can play with or choose to entirely ignore. Exploring the interstices of cinema, performance and other arts, its dynamic staging of the limits and possibilities of the medium calls upon us to engage in how we experience the shared “present” in the event of projection.

THE OPEN FRAME will present contemporary works by Britt Al-Busultan (FIN), Scott Fitzpatrick (CAN), Sally Golding (AUS/UK), Guy Sherwin (UK) and ZEROPIXEL (FR) that transform sound, image and space to create unrestrained, exuberant and wide open cinematic events.