New Kurt Kren Book

Passages of Peter Gidal’s writings (excerpted from Materialist Film) appear in a new volume on Kurt Kren, published by Intellect Books and edited by Nicky Hamlyn, Simon Payne, and A. L. Rees.

Kurt Kren: Structural Films is a 298 page book that collects together interviews, film scores, new and out of print texts on the work of the Austrian filmmaker. A screening and book launch takes place at Close-Up Film Centre on Monday 30 May 2016.

“A series of quick cuts resulting in short bursts of half-second film movements, in Kurt Kren’s Trees in Autumn (Bäume im Herbst) (Austria, 1960) can instigate a specific one to one relation rather than becoming a variegated jumble of images or an impressionistic haze. Bit such a process as in this film forces the viewer to make of the possible jumble of images discreen and separate segments. The process of the film demands a disruption of the  ‘normal’ cultural codes of viewing. Each shot becomes analysed and examined during the viewing, simultaneous to the moment to moment shock of each suceeding half-second ‘flash’.” (Peter Gidal)