EPISODE 10 — Psyché Tropes

Psyché Tropes Episode 10
11pm, 27 February 2023 on Resonance 104.4FM

Psyché Tropes Episode 10 presented by Steven McInerney, features soundtracks taken exclusively from films that use flicker as part of the cinematic apparatus to create abstraction, rhythm and temporal structure within visual music.

Kicking off the episode is Rectangle and Rectangles by René Jodoin. This didactic film in disguise is a progression of brilliant geometric shapes that bombard the screen to the insistent beat of drums. The filmmaker programmed a computer to coordinate a highly complex operation involving an electronic beam of light, colour filters and a camera. This animated film from 1984, is designed to expose the power of the cinematic medium, and to illustrate the abstract nature of time.

Following on is a storoboscopic video snyth piece from 2014 directed by Montreal-based artist Sabrina Ratté titled Afterimage Selves proceeded by a quantum flickering sequence from the Psyché Tropes 2017 film A Creak In Time with music by Howlround.

Elli consists of a seascape shot from the spot that marks the start of World War II with colour optical mixing created by various flicker effects.

OffOn by Scott Bartlett is an avant-garde collage and kaleidoscope of shifting and fractured images, flashing colors, and pulsing rhythms from 1968 with music by Manny Miar. Apotheosis (1972) by Lillian Schwartz is developed from images made in the radiation treatment of human cancer with Computer data supplied by David Sterling and Music by F. Richard Moore.

Cycles Three by Guy Sherwin is live performance for two 16mm projectors and two loudspeakers. The material used in Cycles is recycled for two screens and two soundtracks, with one tinted screen set inside a second b/w screen. This combination gives rise to a surprising range of induced colours and afterimages, as well as complex cross-rhythms in the soundtrack with subtle shifts of focus with changes in volume and tone.

Like most of Noé’s films, We Fuck Alone suggests an altered state. Provoking a perceptual and visceral reaction to the dark and hallucinatory strobing and deep pulsing soundtrack, we are drawn into a solitary self-referential world of simultaneous seduction and repulsion. Here, sex, beauty and violence combine to create a mes-meric and unforgettable landscape entirely on its own.

Finishing off Episode 10 is the soundtrack to Norman McClaren’s 1968 Masterpiece Pas De Deux. A hypnotic world of movement and light in this entrancing film that harnesses the power of cinema to trace the movements of ballet. The film was photographed on high contrast stock, with optical, step-and-repeat printing, for a sensuous and almost stroboscopic appearancecreating a dream-like effect in this award-winning film from the master of animation.

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