Synopses & Reviews
Any new film and any new book by French filmmaker Chris Marker is an event. Marker gave film lovers one of their most memorable experiences with La Jete (1962)--a time-travel montage set after a nuclear war that inspired Terry Gilliam's Twelve Monkeys (1995). His still camerawork is not as well known, but Marker has been taking photographs as long as he has been making films. Staring Back presents 200 black-and-white photographs from Marker's personal archives, taken from 1952 to 2006. Some of the photographs are related to his classic films (which include Le Jete, Sans Soleil, Cuba Si!, and The Case of the Grinning Cat), others are portraits of famous faces (Simone Signoret, Akira Kurosawa), but most are pictures of people Marker has encountered as he has traveled the world (an extra who appeared in Kurosawa's Ran, a woman seen on a street in Siberia). The central section of the book contains a series of photographs documenting political protests Marker has witnessed, including the march on the Pentagon in 1967, the events of May 1968 in Paris, and the tumultuous 2006 demonstrations protesting the French government's proposed employment policies.
The photographs are accompanied by several unpublished texts by Marker, including the English language text of The Case of the Grinning Cat and Marker's annotations for some of the photos. The book--which appears in conjunction with an exhibition at the Wexner Center for the Arts at The Ohio State University--also includes essays by Wexner Center curator Bill Horrigan and art historian Molly Nesbit.
Review
"Relationscapes proposes a new and systematic rethinking of movement which at the same time revitalizes classic questions in esthetics and philosophy: how does force engender forms, how do forms capture force, how does movement engender itself, what is the space-time of movement's incipience, what is the new, what is a gesture? The analysis is subtle and finely woven. The author's movement of thought seamlessly unfolds before the reader, bringing into emergence a world of teeming intensities and forces. Movement, perception, body, image, time, space, rhythm, all of these notions are reformulated at the crossroads of art and philosophy. A scintillating book, of great power and originality." -- José Gil, Department of Philosophy, New University of Lisbon --Jose Gil
Review
Erin Manning holds a University Research Chair in the Faculty of Fine Arts at Concordia University in Montreal. She is director of the Sense Lab and the author of Politics of Touch: Sense, Movement, Sovereignty and Ephemeral Territories: Representing Nation, Home, and Identity in Canada. The MIT Press The MIT Press The MIT Press
Review
What commonalities do the Aboriginal paintings by Dorothy Napangardi, Emily Kwyame, and Clifford Possum share with the Western images of McLaren, Leni Riefenstahl, and David Spriggs? Each artist's production, as explored by Manning, unfolds a topology of the mind, an elasticity of movement between feeling and thinking. Manning's writing is itself a bath of sensory experiences as she brings these art pieces to life. Relationscapes creates ephemeral anchors for new journeys. The MIT Press
Review
"A groundbreaking work! There is currently no book I know of like it in the thoroughness, depth, and sweep. Relationscapes offers a unique approach to a central series of issues in both continental philosophy and cultural theory."
—Andrew Murphie, School of English, Media, and Performing Arts, University of New South Wales"What commonalities do the Aboriginal paintings by Dorothy Napangardi, Emily Kame Kngwarreye, and Clifford Possum share with the Western images of McLaren, Leni Riefenstahl, and David Spriggs? Each artist's production, as explored by Manning, unfolds a topology of the mind, an elasticity of movement between feeling and thinking. Manning's writing is itself a bath of sensory experiences as she brings these art pieces to life. Relationscapes creates ephemeral anchors for new journeys."
—Barbara Glowczewski, author of the Dream Trackers digital project, senior researcher at the Laboratory of Social Anthropology, Collège de France"Relationscapes proposes a new and systematic rethinking of movement which at the same time revitalizes classic questions in esthetics and philosophy: how does force engender forms, how do forms capture force, how does movement engender itself, what is the space-time of movement's incipience, what is the new, what is a gesture? The analysis is subtle and finely woven. The author's movement of thought seamlessly unfolds before the reader, bringing into emergence a world of teeming intensities and forces. Movement, perception, body, image, time, space, rhythm, all of these notions are reformulated at the crossroads of art and philosophy. A scintillating book, of great power and originality."
—José Gil, Department of Philosophy, New University of Lisbon
Review
"A groundbreaking work! There is currently no book I know of like it in the thoroughness, depth, and sweep. Relationscapes offers a unique approach to a central series of issues in both continental philosophy and cultural theory." --Andrew Murphie, School of English, Media, and Performing Arts, University of New South Wales The MIT Press
Review
andlt;Pandgt;"A groundbreaking work! There is currently no book I know of like it in the thoroughness, depth, and sweep. Relationscapes offers a unique approach to a central series of issues in both continental philosophy and cultural theory." --Andrew Murphie, School of English, Media, and Performing Arts, University of New South Walesandlt;/Pandgt; The MIT Press
Review
andlt;Pandgt;andquot;What commonalities do the Aboriginal paintings by Dorothy Napangardi, Emily Kwyame, and Clifford Possum share with the Western images of McLaren, Leni Riefenstahl, and David Spriggs? Each artist's production, as explored by Manning, unfolds a topology of the mind, an elasticity of movement between feeling and thinking. Manning's writing is itself a bath of sensory experiences as she brings these art pieces to life. Relationscapes creates ephemeral anchors for new journeys.andquot;--Barbara Glowczewski, author of the Dream Trackers digital project, senior researcher at the Laboratory of Social Anthropology, Collège de Franceandlt;/Pandgt; The MIT Press The MIT Press Barbara Glowcsewski
Review
andlt;Pandgt;"What commonalities do the Aboriginal paintings by Dorothy Napangardi, Emily Kame Kngwarreye, and Clifford Possum share with the Western images of McLaren, Leni Riefenstahl, and David Spriggs? Each artist's production, as explored by Manning, unfolds a topology of the mind, an elasticity of movement between feeling and thinking. Manning's writing is itself a bath of sensory experiences as she brings these art pieces to life. andlt;Iandgt;Relationscapesandlt;/Iandgt; creates ephemeral anchors for new journeys." andlt;Bandgt;Barbara Glowczewski andlt;/Bandgt;, author of the andlt;Iandgt;Dream Trackersandlt;/Iandgt; digital project, senior researcher at the Laboratory of Social Anthropology, Collège de Franceandlt;/Pandgt;
Synopsis
Photographs by one of French cinema's most influential and enigmatic artists.
Synopsis
With Relationscapes, Erin Manning offers a new philosophy of movement challenging the idea that movement is simple displacement in space, knowable only in terms of the actual. Exploring the relation between sensation and thought through the prisms of dance, cinema, art, and new media, Manning argues for the intensity of movement. From this idea of intensity -- the incipiency at the heart of movement -- Manning develops the concept of preacceleration, which makes palpable how movement creates relational intervals out of which displacements take form. Discussing her theory of incipient movement in terms of dance and relational movement, Manning describes choreographic practices that work to develop with a body in movement rather than simply stabilizing that body into patterns of displacement. She examines the movement-images of Leni Riefenstahl, Étienne-Jules Marey, and Norman McLaren (drawing on Bergson's idea of duration), and explores the dot-paintings of contemporary Australian Aboriginal artists. Turning to language, Manning proposes a theory of prearticulation claiming that language's affective force depends on a concept of thought in motion. Relationscapes takes a "Whiteheadian perspective," recognizing Whitehead's importance and his influence on process philosophers of the late twentieth century -- Deleuze and Guattari in particular. It will be of special interest to scholars in new media, philosophy, dance studies, film theory, and art history.
Synopsis
A new philosophy of movement that explores the active relation between sensation and thought through the prisms of dance, cinema, art, and new media.
Synopsis
andlt;Pandgt;A new philosophy of movement that explores the active relation between sensation and thought through the prisms of dance, cinema, art, and new media.andlt;/Pandgt;
Synopsis
andlt;Pandgt;With andlt;Iandgt;Relationscapesandlt;/Iandgt;, Erin Manning offers a new philosophy of movement challenging the idea that movement is simple displacement in space, knowable only in terms of the actual. Exploring the relation between sensation and thought through the prisms of dance, cinema, art, and new media, Manning argues for the intensity of movement. From this idea of intensity--the incipiency at the heart of movement--Manning develops the concept of preacceleration, which makes palpable how movement creates relational intervals out of which displacements take form. Discussing her theory of incipient movement in terms of dance and relational movement, Manning describes choreographic practices that work to develop with a body in movement rather than simply stabilizing that body into patterns of displacement. She examines the movement-images of Leni Riefenstahl, Étienne-Jules Marey, and Norman McLaren (drawing on Bergson's idea of duration), and explores the dot-paintings of contemporary Australian Aboriginal artists. Turning to language, Manning proposes a theory of prearticulation claiming that language's affective force depends on a concept of thought in motion. andlt;Iandgt;Relationscapesandlt;/Iandgt; takes a andquot;Whiteheadian perspective,andquot; recognizing Whitehead's importance and his influence on process philosophers of the late twentieth century--Deleuze and Guattari in particular. It will be of special interest to scholars in new media, philosophy, dance studies, film theory, and art history.andlt;/Pandgt;
About the Author
Martin Kenney is a Professor in the Department ofHuman and Community Development, University ofCalifornia, Davis, and Senior Project Director at theBerkeley Roundtable on the International Economy.