This is a sad week indeed. All of us at Canyon Cinema will miss George and his amazing sense of humor and satire. George has always been a source of comical wisdom to all of us here. Also missed will be Jordan Belson. I was lucky to be able to work with him on my series of Film Screenings in 1999 called Shake the Nation where I was able to program two exhibitions of his work and have an internegative created of three of his valuable works. I was also lucky enough to have several in depth telephone conversations with him. He lived around the corner from my apartment in North Beach.
Dominic Angerame Canyon Cinema ________________________________ From: Steve Polta <stevepo...@yahoo.com> To: Experimental Film Discussion List <frameworks@jonasmekasfilms.com> Sent: Wed, September 7, 2011 1:36:55 PM Subject: Re: [Frameworks] R.I.P. Jordan Belson (1926-2011) Wow. The phantom filmmaker of San Francisco. Living all these years in North Beach, interacting with very few. A mystery. I always hoped he would make an unannounced appearance... --- On Wed, 9/7/11, C Keefer <kee...@earthlink.net> wrote: >From: C Keefer <kee...@earthlink.net> >Subject: [Frameworks] R.I.P. Jordan Belson (1926-2011) >To: visualmusicp...@yahoogroups.com, frameworks@jonasmekasfilms.com >Date: Wednesday, September 7, 2011, 11:53 AM > > > >We are sad to report that filmmaker/artist Jordan Belson died early Tuesday >morning, September 6, at his home in San Francisco, of heart failure. He was >85. >A memorial screening is planned for the near future in the San Francisco Bay >Area, plus tribute screenings in several other cities. Details will follow >soon. > > >Jordan Belson created abstract films richly woven with cosmological imagery, >exploring consciousness, transcendence, and the nature of light itself. > >Born in Chicago in 1926, Belson studied painting at the California School of >Fine Art (now San Francisco Art Institute), and received his B.A., Fine Arts >(1946) from The University of California, Berkeley. He saw films by Oskar >Fischinger, Norman McLaren and Hans Richter at the historic Art in Cinema >screening series in San Francisco in the late 1940s. Belson was inspired to >make >films with scroll paintings and traditional animation techniques, calling his >first films "cinematic paintings." > >Curator Hilla Rebay at The Museum of Non-Objective Painting, New York, >exhibited >his paintings, and upon Fischinger's recommendation awarded Belson several >grants. From 1957-1959, Belson was Visual Director for The Vortex Concerts at >San Francisco's Morrison Planetarium, a series of electronic music concerts >accompanied by visual projections. Composer Henry Jacobs curated the music >while >Belson created visual illusions with multiple projection devices, combining >planetarium effects with patterns and abstract film footage. His Vortex work >inspired his abandoning traditional animation methods to work with real time >projected light. He completed Allures (1961), Re-entry (1964), Phenomena >(1965), >Samadhi (1967), and continued with a series of abstract films. His varied >influences include yoga, Eastern philosophies and mysticism, astronomy, >Romantic >classical music, alchemy, Jung, non-objective art, mandalas and many more. > >Belson produced an extraordinary body of over 30 abstract films, sometimes >called "cosmic cinema." He produced ethereal special effects for the film The >Right Stuff (1983). His last completed film was Epilogue (2005), commissioned >by >The Hirshhorn Museum. He is survived by his long time partner, Catherine >Heinrich. (Revised bio by C. Keefer, for Guggenheim Museum's "The Third Mind" >catalog, 2008.) > >More information about Belson and his work can be found on his approved >research >pages, at >www.centerforvisualmusic.org/Belson > >Earlier in 2011, Belson wrote a statement asking people not to put his films >online, as it did not do justice to his work. > >In lieu of flowers, Belson's partner Ms. Heinrich requests that donations be >made to Center for Visual Music's preservation and digitization work to >continue >preserving the legacy of Jordan Belson. Contact cvmarchive (at) gmail.com > > >posted by: >Cindy Keefer >Center for Visual Music >Los Angeles, CA >213-683-1514 >cvmaccess (at) gmail.com >www.centerforvisualmusic.org > > > >_______________________________________________ >FrameWorks mailing list >FrameWorks@jonasmekasfilms.com >https://mailman-mail5.webfaction.com/listinfo/frameworks >
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