Treasures IV: American Avant Garde 1947-1986 (2 Disc)

Magnificent treatment of a neglected tradition....
My first encounter with the American Avant-Garde occurred in the mid-70's, when the Museum of Modern Art sponsored a six-part retrospective at one of the local cultural venues. I remember the initial program included Kenneth Anger's "Fireworks" and--I believe--Maya Deren's "Meshes of the Afternoon." The hall was filled to capacity. With each successive showing, attendance declined by 50%. By the final showing six weeks later--which featured "nostalgia" by Hollis Frampton and George Landau's "Bardo Follies"--the audience had shrunk to no more than a dozen people, myself included. One of my friends wouldn't speak to me for months because I'd made him sit though a Paul Sharits flicker film.

Probably no other art form has alienated audiences in America like the experimental film. Casual viewers can at least accept non-objective art as decorative, casual listeners can handle some electronica and even the prepared piano music of John Cage as background music. But only a...

Takes a completely different approach than the first three sets
This set contains 26 Avant Garde films never before on VHS or DVD. The artists/directors include those who worked outside the mainstream of cinema for much of their careers. The running time is five hours and includes animation, documentary, and live-action shorts. This set is more like the first "Treasures" in that it is more modern in its content. Treasures 2 and three are more for film buffs that are interested in cinema up to the year 1930. I believe that all of these films are very short (under one half hour) in length. Below I show the film, the director, and the year it was made if I can find that information.

Featured Films include:
"Here I Am" (Bruce Baillie) - 1962,
"Aleph" (Wallace Berman),
"The Riddle of Lumen" (Stan Brakhage) - 1972,
"Eyewash" (Robert Breer) -1959,
"Bridges-Go-Round" (Shirley Clarke) - 1958,
"By Night with Torch and Spear" (Joseph Cornell),
"Pey ote Queen" (Storm De Hirsch),
"nostalgia" (Hollis...

Diverse collection, a must have
Really, you can't argue with a two disc, five hour set that truly delivers at the rate this does, including newly remastered films previously unavailable on video or DVD by artists like Stan Brakhage, Marie Menken, Ken Jacobs, George Kuchar, Hollis Frampton and many, many more. The packaging is fantastic, coming in a great thick case to house both DVDs and the greatly informative booklet with about 1 1/2 to 2 pages of text about each contributing film maker. Some films here include an optional sound track of new music by Anthology Film Archives composer-in-residence John Zorn. This particularly works with Wallace Berman's "Aleph." In fact, the optional soundtracks for many of these offer a little insight. For example, Shirley Clarke's "Bridges Go Round" has the option to play either the original track intended for it by Louis and Bebe Barron, or music by Teo Macero, composed later on as a replacement soundtrack after copyright troubles forbid the use of the Barron track...

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