5 “We Must Prepare!”: Dziga Vertov and the Avant-Garde Reception of Television

2020 ◽  
pp. 145-166
Keyword(s):  
Avant Garde ◽  
Dziga Vertov

Vertov, Dziga (b. January 2, 1896, Bialystok, Poland; d. February 12, 1954, Moscow, Russia)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ivan Eubanks
Keyword(s):  
Production Methods ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Cognitive Limitations ◽  
Dziga Vertov

Derived from the sound of a working film-reel and the word "vertet´sia" (to spin), Dziga Vertov is the pseudonym of David (aka Denis) Kaufman, a Soviet documentarian and prominent avant-garde director. Like his Futurist and Constructivist associates, Vertov believed machines would liberate people from their physical and cognitive limitations. Viewing cinema as a hybrid human-mechanical mode of perception, he asserted that it could transcend subjectivity and unveil aspects of reality not otherwise accessible, because the camera’s ability to show us "life caught unawares" (Kino-Eye, 41) helped the edited film product to "show and elucidate life as it is" (Kino-Eye, 47). Vertov’s neo-empiricist methodology originated with his early journalistic experience making a newsreel series called Kino-nedelia (Cinema-Week; 1918–1919). In 1919, he formed a group named "Kino Glaz" (Cinema Eye), along with his editor, Elizaveta Svilova (whom he married in 1923) and his brother Mikhail Kaufman. The members called themselves "kinoki" (cine-eyes). Vertov outlined their principles in "We: Variant of a Manifesto" (1922). Decrying theatrical cinema, he insisted that film’s potential to reveal truth could only be realized when filmmakers overcame their addiction to scripts, actors, costumes, and sets. From his perspective, the production methods of theatrical cinema obligated filmmakers to peddle illusions and thereby perpetuated bourgeois values.

Dziga Vertov

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alla Gadassik
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Early Adulthood ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Media Technology ◽  
Subsequent Work ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Political Cinema ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Dziga Vertov ◽  
Movie Camera

Dziga Vertov (b. 1896, Bialystok, Russian Empire–d. 1954, Moscow, USSR) was a pioneering Soviet filmmaker, whose films and manifestos played a central role in 20th century documentary, experimental film, and political cinema traditions. Working in the USSR in the 1920s–1950s, Vertov led the radical Kino-Eye (Cine-Eye) collective, which championed a new film language that would draw on the unique mechanical and audiovisual properties of cinematography, rather than on theatre or literature traditions. His polemical resistance to narrative fiction films contributed to the development of avant-garde documentary techniques in the Soviet Union and abroad. Long after Vertov fell out of favor in his native country, his work continued to influence international documentary cinema and political media groups. Born as David Abelevich Kaufman, Dziga Vertov adopted his pseudonym in early adulthood, and his subsequent work often blurs the lines between the filmmaker’s personal experiences and ideas ascribed to his alter ego. This split between Vertov’s personal life and his constructed persona reflected his belief that cinema, too, could simultaneously document observed reality and construct an entirely new reality from captured slices of life. Vertov maintained that filmmakers should seek out and expose the hidden social and political forces that govern life, using moving images and sound to shape spectator consciousness. His films were in dialogue with several avant-garde art movements, and he often experimented with different film techniques in hopes of both depicting and transforming reality. Moreover, Vertov argued that media technology, especially the movie camera and the wireless radio, would radically change how human beings navigated the world and how they understood their place in society. His theoretical writings are foundational to the discipline of film studies and to writings on film cinematography and montage. His seminal 1929 film Man with a Movie Camera (Chelovek s Kinoapparatom) is a cornerstone of film courses worldwide.

scholarly journals V-v-Vertov R-r-Re-Made

2014 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 77-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Ole Pedersen ◽  
Jan Løhmann Stephensen
Keyword(s):  
Digital Media ◽  
Documentary Film ◽  
Participatory Culture ◽  
New Materialism ◽  
Film Genre ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
American Artist ◽  
Dziga Vertov ◽  
Film Language ◽  
Movie Camera

Abstract The seminal work of pioneering avant-garde filmmaker Dziga Vertov, The Man with the Movie Camera (Chevolek s kino-apparatom, 1929) has given rise to a number of discussions about the documentary film genre and new digital media. By way of comparison with American artist Perry Bard’s online movie project entitled Man With a Movie Camera: The Global Remake (2007), this article investigates the historical perspective of this visionary depiction of reality and its impact on the heralded participatory culture of contemporary digital media, which can be traced back to Russian Constructivism. Through critical analysis of the relation between Vertov’s manifest declarations about the film medium and his resulting cinematic vision, Bard’s project and the work of her chief theoretical inspiration Lev Manovich are examined in the perspective of ‘remake culture,’ participatory authorship and the development a documentary film language. In addition to this, possible trajectories from Vertov and his contemporary Constructivists to recent theories of ‘new materialism’ and the notion of Man/Machine-co-operation is discussed in length.

scholarly journals Mediateka Babel. YouTube jako temat, rama formalna i platforma sztuki

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 171-189
Author(s):  
Ewa Wójtowicz
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Cultural Production ◽  
Global Network ◽  
Digital Culture ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Moving Images ◽  
Meta Level ◽  
Formal Framework ◽  
Dziga Vertov ◽  
The One

The text focuses on the specific features of the so-called 'cinematic turn' within the scope of visual culture emergent within the YouTube platform, particularly during its first, formative years. This turn takes place on the meta-level of the existing circulation of content enabled by YouTube, often being an autothematic reflection on this tool of cultural production. The vernacular aesthetics, a specific formal framework and a particular modus operandi of YouTube became the subject of artistic statements, sometimes in a form of subversive remix. Therefore I think of YouTube as a realm of art because of its meta-media practice that made the cinematic turn visible. It does not rely on straightforwardly understood production of (moving) images, but  postproduction, as understood by Nicolas Bourriaud. Moreover, the cinematic turn taking place within YouTube is different from the one practised by the avant-garde of 20th century, due its being not “seeing” or “writing” (as Dziga Vertov understood montage) but rather “overwriting”, to use language more adequate to the described sphere of digital culture. Artists use YouTube as an open library, working with its resources, applying techniques such as postproduction, remix, re-contextualisation and appropriation. Therefore it becomes a multimedia library, a “Mediateca Babel” of a kind, to recall J. L. Borges' idea. The examples mentioned in the text are of a postproductional nature, such as to-camera-performance and subversive “overwriting” of contents enabled with the circulationism typical for social media. Equally important are the strategies of recognising the cultural framework of YouTube, in the context of 20th-century media art history, as well as the platform’s interface. Also, there is the issue of relations between vernacular creativity and the art system because of “capturing” the amateur-generated content and transferring it to mainstream artworld. These examples let me argue that the cinematic turn is a form of postproduction, which enables the hidden mechanisms behind the circulation of moving images in the overloaded global network. The cinematic turn in the context of YouTube does not mean that cinema and its language are at home within this platform. Also, the meta-artistic way of “making” platform art does not turn YouTube into “art platform” (as understood by Olga Goriunova). Nevertheless, platform art may happen in this context as a result of working with the cinematic turn in its vernacular aspect, which makes it possible to reveal its key features and move them to the meta-level.

scholarly journals POETRY BY DZIGA VERTOV AND ANATOLY MARIENHOF: COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 124-140
Author(s):  
Ekaterina Yu. Belash
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Mutual Influence ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Traumatic Experience ◽  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Revolutionary Era ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Main Technique ◽  
Dziga Vertov ◽  
Personal Histories

The article focuses on a comparative analysis of poems written by Dziga Vertov and Anatoly Marienhof. Despite the fact that the two poets were not acquainted and there is no documentary evidence of their mutual influence, they share a number of similarities in the development of their lives and artistic endeavours, in which the cultural and historical context of their era was reflected. The authors’ early writings share a common cutting technique. Montage became the main technique for describing both the rapidly changing reality of the post-revolutionary era and the fragmentation of the world and consciousness. That explains the duality of the protagonist and the appearance of the image of a buffoon. The similarity between Marienhof’s early poems and Vertov’s ones is also revealed in the predominant tragicomic tone, which is conditioned by the perception of the Revolution as a traumatic experience. Similarity can also be traced in the composition of images: it is cutting again that they use while organizing their metaphors (separate images are combined by thematic or associative links). In later works Marienhof and Vertov reevaluate their personal histories, using the antithesis of “now” and “then”, which shows a tragic turn in the lives of both artists. Apart from that, they turn from avant-garde poetic forms to more traditional ones. Thus, the article explores important stylistic, ideological, and biographical correlations in the work of two Russian avant-gardists.

Barnet, Boris (1902–1965)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vito Adriaensens
Keyword(s):  
Great War ◽  
German Expressionism ◽  
Modern City ◽  
City Life ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Dziga Vertov ◽  
Visual Characteristics ◽  
American Style ◽  
The Relationship

Boris Barnet (b. June 18, 1902, Moscow, Russia; d. January 8, 1965, Riga, Latvia) was a Russian actor, director, and professional boxer. He made his debut as an actor in Lev Kuleshov’s comedy Neobychainye priklyucheniya mistera Vesta v strane bolshevikov (The Extraordinary Adventures of Mr West in the Land of the Bolsheviks) (1924) along with Vsevolod Pudovkin, after they both famously attended Kuleshov’s three-year workshop on film principles that spawned the film. Barnet inherited Kuleshov’s montage principles, consisting of the combination of American-style fast cutting, combined with avant-garde techniques from French Impressionism and German Expressionism, thus setting it apart from its "dull" predecessors. For Kuleshov, the film came together in the editing room, where he insisted on the importance of the relationship between shots and scenes. Barnet debuted with the contemporary spy serial Miss Mend (1926), and became well known for his swiftly paced comedies; he was therefore somewhat of an anomaly in the propaganda-driven Soviet montage cinema. In his two most celebrated comedies, Devushka s korobkoi (The Girl with the Hatbox) (1927) and Dom na Trubnoi (The House on Trubnaya Square) (1928), Barnet took on the speed of modern city life and translated it into an elating style by combining the visual characteristics of Dziga Vertov with the rhythm and acting of someone like Buster Keaton. In the sound era, Barnet continued to impress internationally with lyrical masterpieces such as the understated Great War ensemble piece Okraina (Outskirts) (1933) and the impressionistic fisherman’s drama U samogo sinego morya (By the Bluest of Seas) (1936).

scholarly journals Materiality and Montage: Film Studies, Digital Humanities and the Visualization of Moving Images

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adelheid Heftberger
Keyword(s):  
New Media ◽  
Digital Humanities ◽  
Film Studies ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Moving Images ◽  
Dziga Vertov ◽  
Film And Media Studies ◽  
Computer Scientists ◽  
Research Questions ◽  
The One

In this paper, I will highlight some recent initiatives in the study of film within the digital humanities, in which context I will also present some of my own endeavors, specifically visualizations created in collaboration with the pioneering new media theorist Lev Manovich from films made by the Soviet avant-garde director Dziga Vertov (1896-1954). Following this, I will discuss some of the issues related to the use of visualizations as an aid to scholarly research. Finally, I will address a number of possible research questions in film and media studies, answers to which may benefit significantly from the collaboration between film/media scholars and computer scientists on the one hand, and (moving image) archivists on the other.

Alternative Cinemas

2014 ◽  
pp. 103-128
Author(s):  
Keith Withall
Keyword(s):  
Documentary Film ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Sergei Eisenstein ◽  
Film And Television ◽  
Dziga Vertov ◽  
World Cinema ◽  
Important Trend ◽  
The One ◽  
Selection Of

This chapter assesses alternative cinemas. In the 1920s, there were a series of film movements that were motivated by very different interests than mainstream cinema, primarily political. The most important at the time and the one that has had an enduring influence in world cinema became known as Soviet Montage. Because of their influence, there is an extensive selection of Soviet Montage films available. The chapter then considers filmmakers Sergei Eisenstein and Dziga Vertov. It also looks at the avant-garde and the late silents. Meanwhile, documentary film and especially animation crossover with the mainstream cinema. The developments in the 1920s and John Grierson's founding of the British Documentary Film Movement initiates an important trend in documentary film that still influences film and television today. It also feeds into an idea of ‘British realism’ still apparent in British films.

scholarly journals Shaping the Avant-Garde

2019 ◽  
pp. 273-292
Author(s):  
Pablo Müller
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
American Art ◽  
The United States ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Sergei Eisenstein ◽  
Dziga Vertov ◽  
Specific Manner ◽  
Art Journal ◽  
Art Production

Soviet Constructivism is a central reference for the American art journal October (founded in 1976 and still in print today). This article discusses the ways in which October refers to that historical art movement, while overlooking some of its key political aspirations. Especially during the journal’s founding years, the discursive association with Soviet Constructivism served to bestow criticality, urgency, and sociopolitical relevance on the American art journal. Furthermore, with the reference to Sergei Eisenstein and Dziga Vertov, in particular, the October protagonists have positioned themselves in a specific manner within mid-1970s art critical discourse in the United States. In addition to framing and positioning, the article examines how Soviet Constructivism (alongside Dadaism and Surrealism) becomes for October a key reference for rooting and evaluating the expanded, cross-genre art production post-1945 historically.

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