Synopses & Reviews
Darkness has a history and a uniquely modern form. Distinct from electrification, nightlife, and artificial light, andldquo;artificial darknessandrdquo; has remained entirely overlooked until now. But controlled darkness was essential to the rise of photography, cinema, modern theater, and avant-garde art.
Artificial Darkness is the first book to delve into this phenomenon and its multiple applications across various media and art forms.
In exploring how artificial darkness shaped modern art and film, Noam M. Elcott addresses both sites of production, such as photography darkrooms, film studios, and scientific laboratories, and sites of reception like theaters, cinemas, and exhibitions. He argues that artists, scientists, and entertainers like andEacute;tienne-Jules Marey and Richard Wagner, Georges Mandeacute;liandegrave;s and Oskar Schlemmer, were often less interested in the captured image than in everything surrounding it: the screen, the darkness, and the experience of disembodiment. At the heart of the book is andldquo;the black screen,andrdquo; a technology of darkness crucial to wide-ranging arts and media and the ancestor of todayandrsquo;s blue and green screen technologies.
Turning familiar art and film narratives on their head, Artificial Darkness is a revolutionary treatment of an elusive, yet fundamental, aspect of art and media history.
Synopsis
Etienne-Jules Marey was an inventor whose methods of recording movement revolutionized our way of visualizing time and motion. Best remembered for his chronophotography, Marey constructed a single-camera system that led the way to cinematography.
Picturing Time, the first complete survey of Marey's work, investigates the far reaching effects of Marey's inventions on stream-of-consciousness literature, psychoanalysis, Bergsonian philosophy, and the art of cubists and futurists.
Braun offers a fascinating look at how Marey's chronophotography was used to express the profound transformation in understanding and experiencing time that occurred in the late nineteenth century. Featuring 335 illustrations, Picturing Time includes many unpublished examples of Marey's chronophotographs and cinematic work. It also contains a complete bibliography of his writings and the first catalog of his films, photographic prints, and recently discovered negatives.
Synopsis
Featuring 335 illustrations, Picturing time includes many unpublished examples of Etienne-Jules Marey's chronophotographs and cinematic work. It also contains a complete bibliography of his writings and the first catalog of his films, photographic prints, and recently discovered negatives.
About the Author
Noam M. Elcott is associate professor of art history and archaeology at Columbia University and an editor of the journal Grey Room.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Pt. 1: Marey and His Work
1: Brains in His Fingertips
2: The Writing of Life: The Graphic Method
3: Reinventing the Camera: The Photographic Method
4: Animating Images: The Cinematographic Method
5: The Last Work
Pt. 2: Marey's Legacy
6: Marey, Muybridge, and Motion Pictures
7: Marey, Modern Art, and Modernism
8: Marey and the Organization of Work
Conclusion: Inventing the Inventor
Catalog 1: Photographic Negatives and Prints
Catalog 2: Original Chronophotographic and Photographic Experiments
Catalog 3: Films
Notes
Bibliography of Works by Marey
Index