Program of short films, artists’ films or documentaries where writing, calligraphy or graffiti is at the center of the work. Carried by movement, often of the whole body, the handwriting sometimes frees itself from the human body to create a form of dance by itself on the film roll.

Alighiero Boetti deploys a mirror-like writing in all the space contained in his hands, arms stretched to the extreme, while in China, by tracing ideograms with water on the pavement, Di Shu fans find themselves swept away in a real dance, documented by François Chastanet. In Len Lye’s work, the signs, scratched on the film, are caught in tremors that reflect a writing in constant mutation. Scandalized by the music of the Barma tribe of Chad, the writing here seems to be in a state of trance. For his part, Pierre Leguillon attempts to “reanimate” the multiple forms of writing invented by Jean Dubuffet by manipulating notebooks, books or posters, handwritten by the promoter of Art Brut – forms of writing often inspired by those featured in the exhibition.

Screening proposed and presented by Pierre Leguillon and Paul Peyrolle, Work.Master student at HEAD – Genève.

Program:

Alighiero Boetti
Identifications (extrait de la Video Galerie Gerry Schum), 1970,  2’13”

François Chastanet
Di Shu, Beijing, 2011, 0’39”
Di Shu, Beijing, 2011, 1’32”
Di Shu, Beijing, 2011, 1’04”
Di Shu, Shangai, 2011, 0’52”
Di Shu, Shangai, 2011, 3’26”

Gary Hill
Happenstance (part one of many parts), 1982–83, 6’30”

Pierre Leguillon
Dubuffet typographe, 2013, 18’07”

Len Lye
Free Radicals, 1958, 3’24”

…and a suprise film

Special thanks to François Chastanet, Gary Hill as well as Laurence and Simon Collins.

Cover image: François Chastanet, Dishu Outline, Shangai, 2011