Colorado-based nonprofit organization, Process Reversal, presents the third installment of its unique traveling film series — Frenkel Defects.

This recurring series aims to explore what it means to work in — and exhibit on — photochemical film today by examining works from artists operating specifically in this practice. Often, this involves getting their hands dirty at every stage of the process: from optical effects to photo-processing, editing and contact printing, optical sound recording, and even the creation of the photosensitive emulsion itself… As a result (and as suggested by the series’ title), creative aberrations make their way into the standard photochemical process, giving birth to a new, textural aesthetic that plays out on the surface of the film strip. More than ever before, film reminds us of its physicality, giving a new sense to Andrei Tarkovsky’s idea of “sculpting in time.”

For this year’s edition, two 70-minute programs of rare and diverse works, nearly all of which originate outside North America, will be presented in their intended 16mm format. Almost all of these films were produced with the help of “artist-run film labs” — collectively-run organizations dedicated to facilitating artists’ working in photochemical film — including LaborBerlin (Berlin), L’Abominable (Paris) and Filmwerkplaats (Rotterdam). While these and other organizations have been active in Europe for almost two decades, the trend is just beginning to emerge in North America, with experimental laboratories springing up in Boston, Oakland, Denver, New York, Vancouver, Montreal and elsewhere. Process Reversal, having secured abundant donations of lab equipment, hopes to continue assisting in the growth of these spaces by providing communities with the critical tools, knowledge and resources necessary to ensure the viability of the medium for all.

Additionally, in support of the tour, Process Reversal member Kevin Rice will be facilitating a workshop on “Emulsion Making & Coating for Motion Picture Film” at AS220 on October 19-20; more info here: http://shop.as220.org/products/emulsion

Program Details

Program 1

Schleusenroth | Volga (504 feet, 1.33:1, Wild Sound, Germany/Lebanon)

“Looking at river locks.”

Flow | Lichun Tseng (612 feet, 1.33:1, Optical Sound, Netherlands)

“Change is a process, is the starting point equal to the end point? What if everything is in a flow, what meaning of value of life can be derived from the interconnectedness of all things? Reflecting the subtle relationships between the flow of changing, awareness of being and observation of breathing through abstract and rhythmic moving images. Integrating and developing a poetic state of contemplative and meditative process and flow in between void and solid; moving and still; expanding and gathering; strength and softness.”

Fractions | Guillaume Mazloum (1620 feet, 1.33:1, Optical Sound, France)

“Fractions is a seven part film. Seven sequences, each with a pattern and a reference to a text of a political nature, to create a space for reflection on the scope and responsibility of these images. Between self-portrait and testimony, each fraction is an autonomous thinking, remaining yet necessary to the overall restitution of a personal research on film practice, in correlation with the emancipatory thinking. The images then become a pretext for this reflection, freed from their narrative and documentary nature, the site of a more intimate experience. This work draws the accomplishment of several years of reading, strewed with fleeting moments of reality captured instinctively with my camera, all reworked and remodeled with traditional cinema tools.”

Program 2

Konrad & Kurfurst | Esther Urlus (252 feet, 1.33:1, Optical Sound, Netherlands)

“A fictional re-enactment of a 5 minutes happening that took place during the Olympic games in Berlin 1936. Made on home brew emulsion and color toned with the helping hand of technical publications from early cinema and photographic experiments. The home brew emulsion as fragile metaphor for the heroism of Konrad and his horse Kurfurst. Falling from his horse he became a national hero but overtaken by history, an anti-hero.”

WAKE | Eric Stewart (288 feet, 1.33:1, MOS, USA)

“Wake is a dirge in celluloid.  It is a celebration of my father’s life, a meditation on his body and a visual record of mourning.  When my father died, there was never a chance to see his body after life had left it.  This film was made by placing his ashes directly on 35mm film in a dark room and moving the film a frame at a time.  What we see in this process of photograming is not the object in the photographic sense, but instead a representation of the space surrounding an object.  The photogram is a shadow charting the distance between things.”

In the Traveler’s Heart  | DISTRUKTUR  (720 feet, 1.33:1, Optical Sound, Lithuania/Germany/Brazil)

“The winter reigns as the Traveler crosses by feet an ancient landscape.

In this place there’s also another presence, someone who’s very similar to the Traveler. Does the Traveler realise this figure that cohabits the same space as him? Is the other a guardian angel or a devil?”

Aula Magna | Andrés Denegri (360 feet, 1.33:1, Optical Sound, Argentina)

“A structural farewell poem made for a beloved place. The images were shot frame by frame over the course of a year, in order to portray the author’s home main room through the variation of the light coming from a window. The sound, by Pablo Denegri, was made by mixing and processing, in real time, direct recordings made in the same space.”

Split Film 100110 | Dražen Zanchi  (1080 feet, 1.33:1, Wild Sound, Croatia/France)

Boats are entering in the Split harbor. Each sequence is a maneuver: slow and continuous. Nevertheless, boats and their movements become more and more difficult to recognize because the image is drawn in fluctuations of its physical elements. Textures of bulky light layers and grainy grey noises are confounded with the soundtrack. The latter is articulated around the touch, i.e. local and non-propagating formations grafted on thick resonant and tonal substrate.

About Process Reversal

Process Reversal is a US based, tax exempt organization & programming collective whose mission and purpose is to advocate and ensure the viability of film for all.

Since 2012, Process Reversal has been producing several educational programs oriented towards the promotion of the argentic arts, including travelling workshops and screenings that have visited over 20 countries and 50 discreet film communities around the world. Today, Process Reversal continues to operate these programs, but has also expanded into charitable initiatives to help further achieve its purpose. This includes the Film Labs Program which aims to supply celluloid oriented communities (especially those in the US) with the necessary resources to build, operate and maintain public facilities for working with and presenting on motion picture film. Among those resources, Process Reversal has been fortunate enough to receive donations of countless pieces of essential equipment — including projectors, contact printers, optical printers and optical sound camera — which it plans to distribute to these communities and train them in their maintenance and operation. In addition to this, Process Reversal also focuses on designing and manufacturing new equipment for use in everything from processing to projection.