Session 1: “experimenting”

Saturday May 3, 2:00 pm to 5:00 pm. Presented by Hors champ, this free event is part of the ‘Reflecting on programming: critical and creative gestures’ series. First come, first served.

Guest programmers: Benjamin R. Taylor and Noa Blanche, filmmakers and film programmers, from la lumière collective

Moderator: Nour Ouayda, member of Hors champ, filmmaker and film programmer

Discussant: film programmer and distribution coordinator at Vidéographe

Experimental cinema is unique in that it operates outside commercial circuits and the general public. At once very present and discreet on the scale of the Montreal scene, this cinema, which has links with the visual arts, performance art and animation, also has the particularity of diverting the narrativity of traditional cinema towards ways of making that are more closely linked to materiality, process and perception. In doing so, experimental cinema agrees to work within forms of opacity that reflect on creation and question conventional positions of spectatorship.

By virtue of this greater opacity, experimental cinema requires what might be described as more sustained support, something that has been deployed since 2015 by lumière collective, an organization that defines itself as a collective of artists and curators, a micro-cinema presenting films on their original medium and a space for artistic practice and residencies. Since its creation, the organization has overseen a series of programs (VISIONS, IN SITU) and sought to facilitate the dissemination of experimental forms. In an overtly collaborative and horizontal spirit, la lumière collective organizes screenings in the presence of artists and aims, in the words of co-founder Benjamin R. Taylor, to “dissect films together in a common space”.

What are the major and minor principles observed by la lumière collective in relation to this spirit of collaboration? How does the gesture of screening experimental cinema become enriched by the la lumière collective’s screening room, and how does this room’s identity, size and location influence the reception of the films? What does experimental cinema programming bring to cinema and art? How do discussions with artists and filmmakers enrich programs beyond what is considered obvious or what is assumed?

This activity is made possible thanks to the support of Periculum. Foundation for Contemporary Art.

More informations to come.