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Shift 

(2010) 

by Max Hattler is a three minute animation and exhibits influences as disparate as modernist abstraction to industrialisation and German Expressionism. Sound by David Kamp.

There are certain moments created by artists where it becomes apparent that they have completed a period and are ready to shift up a gear; challenging themselves, challenging audiences and challenging the body of work that they have already produced. Filmmaker Max Hattler produced in 2010 a piece called Spin. This Busby Berkeley-style dance routine played out by plastic toy soldiers seemed to instigate a slight change in working practice, and he presents his latest work, open now, at Tenderpixel. This new installation of three moving image works is entitled (appropriately enough) Shift. Commissioned between Animate Projects and Channel 4, the work is the latest in a series of co-productions between the two organisations, in a strand called Random Acts, bringing the work of film and video artists to terrestrial broadcast television. Shift is a very strong work. The three minute animation exhibits influences as disparate as modernist abstraction to industrialisation and German Expressionism. The effect is jarring, and in the Tenderpixel basement a fitting mausoleum for sci-fi exploits played out under factory-esque, conveyor-belt conditions. Hattler's work has always been exuberant and anticipatory; Shift presents an abstract apocalypse, hearkening back to the fears of the modern age. It's beautiful, and it's scary, and it's utterly engrossing.

 

Source: Because Magazine

 

 

Dazed Digital: Tell us a bit more about Shift… why did you decide to explore the apocalyptic theme?


Max Hattler: The theme of a dimensional shift is a progression of sorts from 1923 aka Heaven, 1925 aka Hell, and Sync, which all deal with meta/physics. I’m currently very interested in exploring these ideas on the overlap between sacred geometry and spirituality, looking at existence, physics, time and universe as a multi-dimensional machine that can be represented in an abstracted way. Animate Projects approached me about making a film for Channel 4 with them on the subject of 2012 Apocalypse, and I immediately jumped at the chance. After the Tenderpixel show, which contains two more smaller works apart from the film proper, Shift will be broadcast as part of Channel 4’s Random Acts and shown online.

 

Dazed Digital: These works have a strange tribal, ritualistic feel that is so digital but almost pre-historical at the same time. Is this duality something you wanted to convey?


Max Hattler: In all my work, I’m interested in how abstraction can open up spaces for different kinds of audience engagement, how a detachment from the instantly recognisable can open up a space for reflection. The tribal, ritualistic aspect is definitely part of that; repetitive patterns, basic geometry and kaleidoscopes are all instruments in this endeavour. How we respond to geometric symmetries, how we have abstract fever dreams, or what we see on hallucinogenic drugs, It all taps into hard-wired circuits deep inside our brains. In a world over-saturated by the same images, I think that abstraction offers some space to negotiate new meanings, and meditate and reflect on the world around us.

 

Source: Dazed Digital

 

 

Shift, vierecke, kugeln, handmade, Video Art

Reading

Optical Poetry (2004) by Dr. William Moritz is the long-awaited, definitive biography of Oskar Fischinger. The result of over 30 years of research on this visionary abstract filmmaker and painter. In addition to Moritz's comprehensive biography, it includes numerous photographs in colour and black and white (many never before published), statements by Oskar Fischinger about his films, a newly created extensive filmography, and a selected bibliography. (John Libbey Publishing)

Kandinsky (2009) edited by Tracey Bashkof is the first full-scale retrospective of the artist's career to be exhibited in the United States since 1985, when the Guggenheim culminated its trio of groundbreaking exhibitions of the artist's life and work in Munich, Russia, and Paris. This presentation of nearly 100 paintings brings together works from the three institutions that have the greatest concentration of Kandinsky's work in the world, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; and Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich; as well as significant loans from private and public holdings. (Guggenheim)

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SEE ALSO

Rhythm 21 (1921) - original title: Rhythmus 21. An early, abstract animation by Hans Richter composed solely of squares and rectangles that change shape. This another attempt by the artist to apply musical principles to screen images. (Glenn Erickson)

Trioon I (2003) by Karl Kliem. Music by Carsten Nicolai aka Alva Noto and Ryuichi Sakamoto. Both elements of the music, an analog piano and a digital sinus wave, are represented by two overlapping visual elements: the fading sound of the piano by three abstracted octaves of a keyboard with the keys fading out just as softly as the tones fade from hearing. (Dienststelle)

© Center for Visual Music

 

Study No. 7 (1931) - original title: Studie Nr. 7. This short film by Oskar Fischinger was one of a dozen 'studies' spanning the 1920s and '30s. This one is a gorgeous visual tone poem with a few small, dynamic white shapes popping decoratively out of a sea of blackness. (Dr. William Moritz, Canyon Cinema)

ray vibration is a realtime audio-visual performance by Tina Tonagel, Christian Faubel and Ralf Schreiber. Three overhead projectors, three screens and three sound systems. Different electro-kinetic devices, machines and instruments are placed on the projectors. They produce movement and sound. The small sounds of what happens on the projectors are filtered, distorted and amplified. At the same time a triptych in cinemascope format displays magnified, filtered, distorted images of what happens on the screens/fresnel lenses of the projectors. (ray vibration)

Transforma (Baris Hasselbach, Luke Bennett and Simon Krahl), a Berlin based video artist collective, combine the momentum of VJ improvisation with the power of highly composed imagery and narrative. Transforma started producing experimental video art in 2001 and have been taking their imageworld and production processes to higher levels of absurdity ever since. They have worked on promos, concert video and live cinema approaches, in collaboration with Apparat and Funkstörung among others, and have VJed in clubs in Berlin and around Europe. (CueMixMagazine)