Film Comment's 21st Century Avant-Garde Poll

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In the past decade, the making and showing of experimental film worldwide has gone from strength to strength, so much so that it can be categorically said that avant-garde cinema is as vital now as it has ever been. This addendum to our Jan/Feb end-of-decade wrap-up serves to acknowledge just some of the experimental film achievements of the 21st century’s first 10 years. The rankings on the three lists below were obtained through the tabulation of the number of mentions a given film or filmmaker received in poll responses from a 46-strong group of critics, programmers, and teachers.

  1. 1.
    At Sea
    by Peter Hutton

  2. 2.
    Pitcher of Colored Light
    by Robert Beavers

  3. 3.
    ( )
    by Morgan Fisher

  4. 4.
    Ah Liberty!
    by Ben Rivers

  5. 5.
    Observando el Cielo
    by Jeanne Liotta

  6. 6.
    Star Spangled to Death
    by Ken Jacobs

  7. 7.
    Ten Skies
    by James Benning

  8. 8.
    The Fourth Watch
    by Jane Geiser

  9. 9.
    The Heart of the World
    by Guy Maddin

  10. 10.
    ?
    RR
    by James Benning

  11. 11.
    Black and White Trypps Number Three
    by Ben Russell

  12. 12.
    The Decay of Fiction
    by Pat O'Neill

  13. 13.
    The God of Day Had Gone Down Upon Him
    by Stan Brakhage

  14. 14.
    An Injury to One
    by Travis Wilkerson

  15. 15.
    Kolkata
    by Mark LaPore

  16. 16.
    13 Lakes
    by James

  17. 17.
    The General Returns from One Place to Another
    by Michael Robinson

  18. 18.
    Song and Solitude
    by Nathaniel Dorsky

  19. 19.
    False Aging
    by Lewis Klahr

  20. 20.
    The Glass System
    by Mark LaPore

  21. 21.
    Instructions for a Light and Sound Machine
    by Peter Tscherkassky

  22. 22.
    Letter to Uncle Boonmee
    by Apichatpong Weerasethakul

  23. 23.
    She Puppet
    by Peggy Ahwesh

  24. 24.
    Skagafjördur
    by Peter Hutton

  25. 26.
    The Great Art of Knowing
    by David Gatten

  26. 27.
    The Ground
    by Robert Beavers

  27. 28.
    The Hedge Theater
    by Robert Beavers

  28. 29.
    Poetry and Truth
    by Peter Kubelka

  29. 30.
    Sarabande
    by Nathaniel Dorsky

  30. 31.
    ?
    The Visitation
    by Nathaniel Dorsky

  31. 32.
    When It Was Blue
    by Jennifer Reeves

  32. 33.
    ?
    Arbor Vitae
    by Nathaniel Dorsky

  33. 34.
    In Comparison
    by Harun Farocki

  34. 35.
    It’s Not My Memory of It – Three Recollected Documents
    by The Speculative Archive

  35. 36.
    Meditations on Revolution, Part V: Foreign City
    by Robert Fenz

  36. 37.
    Nest of Tens
    by Miranda July

  37. 38.
    O’er the Land
    by Deborah Stratman

  38. 39.
    Psalm III: Night of the Meek
    by Phil Solomon

  39. 40.
    ?
    Winter
    by Nathaniel Dorsky

  40. 41.
    California Trilogy: Los, Sogobi, El Valley Centro
    by James Benning

  41. 42.
    *Corpus Callosum
    by Michael Snow

  42. 43.
    Dream Work (for Man Ray)
    by Peter Tscherkassky

  43. 44.
    Horizontal Boundaries
    by Pat O'Neill

  44. 45.
    Let Each One Go Where He May
    by Ben Russel

  45. 46.
    Still Raining, Still Dreaming
    by Phil Solomon

  46. 47.
    The Two Minutes to Zero Trilogy
    by Lewis Klahr

  47. 48.
    What the Water Said, nos. 4-6
    by David Gatten

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Created by serriform on Jun 27, 2010.
 

Comments

Untitled — 2 years ago

If anybody has images for these films, it would be cool of you to add them.




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