Optical Poetry Oskar Fischinger Retrospective
Presented in association with Center for Visual Music (CVM)
We are thrilled to partner with the Center for Visual Music to showcase their program Optical Poetry: Oskar Fischinger Retrospective that will be screened on our campus on Monday, September 9. This is a rare opportunity to see Fischinger’s pioneer work in abstract animation and visual music. This HD version of CVM’s Retrospective program features his classic visual music films, many transferred from restored 35mm prints and Fischinger’s own nitrates.
Fischinger (1900-1967), hailed as the “Father of Visual Music,” influenced animators and filmmakers worldwide. He created iconic works such as “Allegretto” and “Motion Painting No. 1.” and the groundbreaking 1930s Studies series, which debuted in theaters globally.
This event is co-organized by experimenta.l. and the Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies.
More information about this free screening (no reservations required), including parking and location, can be accessed here: https://calendar.utdallas.edu/event/optical-poetry-oskar-fischinger-retrospective
See below the complete list of films included in the program as provided by CVM:
Spirals (Spiralen) c. 1926, Germany, b/w, silent, restored by CVM
Duration: 2 min.
Scenes composed of concentric circular, spiral and radiating patterns moving in such ways that they produce optical illusions of great depth leading off into an eternally distant vanishing point. (William Moritz)
Wax Experiments (Wachsexperimente) 1921-26, Germany, silent, restored by CVM
Duration: 4 min
Some of Fischinger’s experiments with the wax-slicing machine he invented, synchronizing prepared blocks of wax with the camera’s shutter to create flowing, mystical, mandalic images. (C. Keefer)
Spiritual Constructions (Seelische Konstruktionen, c. 1927, Germany, b/w, silent)
Duration: 6:16 min
Fischinger’s genius in transposing everyday recognizable forms into surreal and abstract ones is irrefutably demonstrated in this incredible film, made when he was still in his twenties. (William Moritz)
Walking from Munich to Berlin (Munchen-Berlin Wanderung) 1927, Germany, b/w, silent
Duration: 2:45 min
Walking from Munich to Berlin is such a sizeable challenge that anyone who undertakes it must have a very good reason. I was motivated mostly by a longing for freedom. (Oskar Fischinger)
Studie Nr. 5 – 1930, Germany, b/w, sound, restored by CVM
Duration: 3:15 min
Music: Foxtrot “I’ve Never Seen a Smile Like Yours” by Johnson and Frazier
One of Fischinger’s “absolute graphic films to music, produced in Berlin and distributed all over the world.” (Fischinger)
Studie Nr. 6 – 1930, Germany, b/w, sound
Duration: 2.5 min
Music: Fandango “Los Verderones” by Jacinto Guerrero
Combines a jolly popular air with a clear statement of the profound mystical imagery exploited in Fischinger’s later works, (Moritz)
Studie Nr. 7 – 1931, Germany, b/w, sound, restored by CVM
Duration: 2.5 min
Music: Brahms “Hungarian Dance Nº 5“
A dynamic dance of abstract light. (Len Lye)
Studie Nr. 8 (1931, Germany, b/w, sound, 5 min)
Duration: 5 min.
Music: Dukas’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”
Study No. 8 is the most complex study in the series. This film takes the parable of the Sorcerer’s Apprentice (which is also the music of the film) to adapt it in a cosmic and contemporary way: the diversity of forms and movements in several sequences recalls the teeming multiplicity of life on earth, and the mad apprentice wishes to generate more matter by dividing the atom. (Moritz)
Coloratura (Koloraturen, 1932, Germany, b/w, sound)
Duration: 1:30 min
Commissioned by Froelich Film as a trailer to [its] feature Gitta Discovers Her Heart, starring a popular operetta singer, Gitta Alpar. (Moritz)
Kreise (Ad Version), (Circles, 1933-34, Germany, color, sound)
Duration: 2 min.
Originally, it was an advertising film for the Tolirag ad agency. Kreise was one of the first color films made in Europe. (CVM)
Muratti greift ein! (Muratti Marches On) (1934, Germany, color, sound), transferred from Fischinger’s own nitrate 35mm film print.
Duration: 4 min.
One of Fischinger’s most well known films, an ad for Muratti featuring waltzing cigarettes which screened in first run theatres world-wide.
Composition in Blue (Komposition in Blau, 1935, Germany, color, sound), transferred from Fischinger’s own nitrate 35mm film print.
Duration: 4 min.
Music: Otto Nicolai’s “The Merry Wives of Windsor Overture”
Whereas each of Fischinger’s previous films had utilized only one basic animation technique, Composition in Blue bursts forth with half a dozen different new techniques – mostly involving pixillation of three-dimensional forms. (William Moritz)
Allegretto (Late Version), (1936-1943, US, color, sound), restored by CVM
Duration: 2:30 min.
Music: Ralph Rainger’s orchestral music recorded at Paramount Studio
Allegretto stands as Fischinger’s greatest achievement in “visual music,” in the strict sense of translating the full complexity of symphonic textures into visual equivalents. Here for the first time he used cels. (Moritz)
Radio Dynamics (1942, US, color, intentionally silent), restored by CVM
Duration: 4:30 min.
I believe this to be Fischinger’s best film, the work in which he most perfectly joined his craftsmanship with his spiritual ideas into a meaningful and relatively faultless whole. No music distracts from the visual imagery which moves with sufficient grace and power of its own. (Moritz)
An American March (1941, US, color, sound)
Duration: 3:45 min.
Fischinger used the common Disney style of hard-edged, outlined figures painted on cells, but he carried the technique far beyond Disney’s limits and made it an integral part of the meaning of the film. (Moritz)
Motion Painting No. 1 (1947, US, color, sound)
Duration: 11 min.
Music: Bach’s “The Brandenburgische Concerto Nº 3”
As the title suggests, it is a painting of or about movement, which is exhibited in various forms and variations: from the movement of a comet in the opening sequence to movement by addition or concretion in the end of the movie. Colors and shapes become the elements of our sense of movement like the motley spirals which themselves unroll at varying speeds and dynamisms – movement of music and painting. (Moritz)
Program provided by Center for Visual Music (www.centerforvisualmusic.org)
Acknowledgments
CVM thanks Barbara Fischinger, William Moritz, Cinemaculture, and its Donors and Members for their support which makes these programs possible.
Wax Experiments was restored by CVM with funding from the National Film Preservation Foundation. Studie Nr 5 was restored by CVM with funding from EYE Filmmuseum. Studie Nr 8 was restored by EYE Filmmuseum.
Please visit CVM’s Fischinger Research Site at
www.centerforvisualmusic.org/Fischinger
To help preserve Oskar Fischinger’s Legacy donate here: http://www.centerforvisualmusic.org/Fischinger/FundingNeeds.htm
Other Resources
Oskar Fischinger (1900-1967): Experiments in Cinematic Abstraction
Edited by Cindy Keefer and Jaap Guldemond
EYE Filmmuseum and Center for Visual Music, 2012
Optical Poetry: The Life and Work of Oskar Fischinger
By William Moritz
John Libbey, 2004
Selected online articles about Fischinger, CVM’s Bibliography:
http://www.centerforvisualmusic.org/Fischinger/OFBibliography.htm