Andre, you were right, Brakhage is...a bit loopy, but I jive with the guy well enough. I found it mostly easy to follow what he was saying (no matter how many statements were in parenthesis).
It was definitely good review material and the humor made it less drone to read. After seeing some of his films, I thought we would be reading some sort of defense for experimental films. I was worried Brakhage would go into some longwinded essay about how scratching emulsion off of film is the purest form of art known to man. It was kind of a relief that it wasn't that type of thing. Not that I don't appreciate this type of art, but I find it much easier to engage in a reading about a practice whilst engaged in that practice myself.
I was actually surprised when Brakhage started with film scratching and inking as an introductory method for learning the tools of the film medium. I'm one of those people that needs to take something apart in order to fully understand it. So I found that to be an interesting way of looking at why we're doing this.
You must know the rules before you break them. This is what I've always been taught, no matter what art class I was taking. I always kind of hated that, but I can see why it is necessary. Everytime I saw an experimental film I would think "these are the film guys breaking the film rules." This article made me look at that statement under a new light.
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