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Experimental (9)

  • Come to your senses
    Come to your senses
    Alicia Eisen  &  Sophie Jarvis 2020 4 min
    Nine artists across the continent document their sensory experiences of lockdown, and the results broke our editing program. What emerges is an absurdist collage that playfully flips the format of a video conference on its head. Filmmakers Alicia Eisen and Sophie Jarvis pose the question: is the human need to make sense of chaos an inherently chaotic pursuit?
  • EdgeCode: I Thought of You Often
    EdgeCode: I Thought of You Often
    Yun Lam Li 2006 5 min
    Translated from a self-reflexive Chinese saying, Yun Lam Li's I thought of you often, this film is a visual poem about the meaning of aging within a culture that is not one's own.
  • Forming Game
    Forming Game
    Malcolm Sutherland 2008 5 min
    This animated short from Malcolm Sutherland is an engaging dance of shapes and sounds. The "game" is played by opening the box, unfolding the board and placing shapes on it that you manipulate with your hands. There are no winners or losers in this game; the fun is in the creative way the forms unfold. Features a score by Luigi Alleman and music by Ravi Shankar.
  • The Irises
    The Irises
    Suzanne Gervais  &  Jacques Giraldeau 1991 3 min
    Although when he was alive, Vincent Van Gogh hadn't enough money to pay for his art materials, a hundred years later his painting "The Irises" sold for an unprecedented sum at a New York auction. This animated short, excerpted from Jacques Giraldeau's 1989 film Le Tableau noir, takes a loving look at the masterwork.
  • The Little Men of Chromagnon
    The Little Men of Chromagnon
    Francine Desbiens 1971 8 min
    In this short animated film, little elf-like creatures emerging from 3 circles painted red, yellow and blue discover the primary colours and their combinations. When they venture into a circle of another colour they find that they, too, change colour. So, how do we make green again?
  • A Little Phantasy on a 19th-century Painting
    A Little Phantasy on a 19th-century Painting
    Norman McLaren 1946 3 min
    Isle of the Dead, by the nineteenth-century painter Arnold Boecklin, is the subject of this McLaren film experiment. The spectral island wakes to mysterious life, flickers in an ethereal light and fades again into the dark--the whole effect heightened by an interpretive musical score by composer Louis Applebaum. (Award: Salerno.)
  • Lost Action: Trace
    Lost Action: Trace
    Marlene Millar Crystal Pite , … 2011 3 min
    This short film addresses the revolving cycles of human conflict through contemporary dance. Celebrated choreographer Crystal Pite and dance filmmakers Marlene Millar & Philip Szporer commemorate the fading legacies of WWI, while also creating a moving homage to Pite’s mentors and contemporaries, whose lives and short careers are pitted against the fleeting nature of the dance art form. Featuring Theodore Ushev’s haunting and distinct artwork, the film explores the themes of conflict, loss, and rescue we all experience as we cycle through states of love and war.

    Warning: Although this film was shot in 3D, the streaming and downloadable versions are available in 2D only.
  • M.C. Escher: Sky and Water 1
    M.C. Escher: Sky and Water 1
    Gayle Thomas 1998 3 min
    This short animation mixes traditional and computer animation to explore one of M.C. Escher's most famous works, the woodcut Sky and Water I (1938). Accompanied by a stunning soundtrack, this mesmerizing film playfully explores and deconstructs the optical illusion within one of the Dutch artist's most recognizable pieces. This film has no dialogue.
  • Third Page from the Sun
    Third Page from the Sun
    Theodore Ushev 2014 5 min
    Heralding the “end of paper,” this experimental animated short is an abstract exploration of a number of big issues, from the ephemerality of the digital age to the practice of recycling. To create this painting in motion, Theodore Ushev took an animation film festival catalogue and set its pages alight with the broad strokes of a paintbrush.