Who Killed Who First: Lineages of Technology and Liberation Through Experimental Film

Abstract

Experimental film is a vast and difficult to navigate field, with many undetectable roots that lie beneath its grainy soil. This study traces and connects some of these both well-known and obscure, analysing how the specifics of the filmmaker’s film mediums worked in tandem with their outsider perspectives. Specifically, it shall explore 3 distinct eras, firstly Maya Deren and her roots in Socialist activism in relation to her 1943 film Meshes of the Afternoon. It then connects her practice to that of Richard Kern and the Cinema of Transgression operating in New York in the 1980s. This movement is underrepresented in academic research, so this shall act as an academic contribution to its discussion within the history of underground film. It finally draws from there to the use of videotape by the filmmakers Charles Pinion and Cecelia Condit, whose work has experienced a cultural resurgence and the contemporary work of Kasper Meltedhair. The research has drawn together numerous sources that have previously been disconnected and also benefited from the insight of Pinion and Meltedhair, semi-structured interviews with whom have supported the 3rd chapter.