Monthly Archives: September 2007

The Act of Seeing with One’s Own Eyes

The Act of Seeing with One’s Own Eyes is a 1971 American film by experimental filmmaker Stan Brakhage. The film focuses on the relations between documentary and fantasy in what may be called a limit experience. The film consists of a series of autopsies in a Pittsburgh morgue and have been described as hard to watch.

Only recommended for very strong stomachs. Here on Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIjkIJvHIzQ, click on for parts two and three.

    Introducing PCL Linkdump

    [Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPATPXGJgKo&]

    Rahsaan Roland Kirk via PCL Linkdump

    Of course I am well aware that, to most of you regular readers, PCL Linkdump is a well known destination; it’s just that I’ve never officially introduced them and give them the shout-out they deserve. PCL Linkdump is run by a team of contributors among which I particularly appreciate the work of Mr. Dante Fontana, who has just posted James Brown & Luciano Pavarotti – It’s A Man’s World in remembrance of Luciano Pavarotti (1935 – 2007).

    [Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCIyzNISw1Q]

    Faultlines in 20th century art

    Fault lines caused by an ancient earthquake

    Faultlines in 20th century art

    The classification above is indebted to Sex in History by Gordon Rattray Taylor (see Matrism and Patrism) and the work of Camille Paglia, especially Sexual Personae. Both theorists classify along Apollonian and Dionysian axes.

    Lost and found: biomorphism

    Unidentified Art Nouveau/Art Deco object

    The previous post by >dmtls Merzbau on Carlo Mollino prompted me to Google for the term biomorphism once more and there it was, the image I had found on the web a couple of years back but had since been unable to find again. Biomorphism connects with anthropomorphism, zoomorphism, Casa Milà, Surrealism, the grotesque, Friedensreich Hundertwasser, Isamu Noguchi, Carlo Mollino, Luigi Colani in the visual realm and with literary tropes in the work of H. P. Lovecraft and Lautréamont; and provides a potent antidote to sexless modernism.

    Baudrillard, Alan Tex and Carlo Mollino

    >dmtls Merzbau is back from a prolonged break.

    I missed his writing as well as that of Ombres Blanches (who is unable to post at the moment). Another fave, Esotika, is posting very lightly these days. A recent interesting post by Esotika was on Hour of the Wolf by Bergman. Esotika’s film viewing habits have changed which prohibits him from writing more frequently. His film corpus is one of the more interesting ones on the web.