From Art Gallery to Movie Theatre: Spectatorship in Julian Rosefeldt’s Manifesto

Hugo Ljungbäck

doi:10.25038/am.v0i15.237

Authors

Hugo Ljungbäck

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i15.237

Keywords:

spectatorship, installation, film exhibition, experimental film, video art, self-reflexivity, duration

Abstract

Experimental films have historically had a contested and marginalized position within film exhibition. With his Manifesto (2015), which has been exhibited both as a video installation in art galleries and as a feature film in movie theatres, Julian Rosefeldt collapsed the barriers between these exhibition spaces. By performing a comparative analysis of Manifesto in both forms, this article outlines the way spectators behave differently in the theatre and the gallery, the different demands the work makes on the viewer in each venue, and the difficulties of transforming the work from one form to another. By asking what is lost and what is gained, this article explores how the text, form, and venue function differently, to reveal underlying assumptions about spectatorship.

Article received: December 31, 2017; Article accepted: January 10, 2018; Published online: April 15, 2018; Original scholarly paper

How to cite this article: Ljungbäck, Hugo. "From Art Gallery to Movie Theatre: Spectatorship in Julian Rosefeldt’s Manifesto." AM Journal of Art and Media Studies 15 (2018): 135–146. doi: 10.25038/am.v0i15.237

Author Biography

Hugo Ljungbäck

Hugo Ljungbäck
University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee
United States

Hugo Ljungbäck is a moving image artist, curator, and scholar, whose film and video works have screened internationally. He is an Undergraduate Research Fellow in the Department of English/Film Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. His primary research interests include experimental film and video, moving image media and technology, and Scandinavian cinema.

References

Andrews, Kimberly Quiogue. “Because I Have Nothing to Say: Julian Rosefeldt’s Manifesto and the Choral Voice.” ASAP Journal (2017). http://asapjournal.com/because-i-have-nothing-to-say-julian-rosefeldts-manifesto-and-the-choral-voice/. Accessed December 27, 2017.

Baudry, Jean-Louis. “The Apparatus: Metapsychological Approaches to the Impression of Reality in Cinema.” In Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings, edited by Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen, 8th edition, 148–65. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016.

Dogramaci, Burcu. “Speaking, Acting, Transforming: The Manifesto as Metamorphosis.” In Manifesto, edited by Anna-Catharina Gebbers, Udo Kittelmann, Justin Paton, Anneke Jaspers, Reinhard Spieler, and Sarah Tutton, 92–5. London: Koenig Books, 2016.

Elwes, Catherine. Installation and the Moving Image. New York: Columbia University Press, 2015. DOI: https://doi.org/10.7312/elwe17450

Gebbers, Anna-Catharina and Udo Kittelmann. “To Give Visible Action to Words.” In Manifesto, edited by Anna-Catharina Gebbers, Udo Kittelmann, Justin Paton, Anneke Jaspers, Reinhard Spieler, and Sarah Tutton, 83–7. London: Koenig Books, 2016.

Gregos, Katerina. “Unpredictable Incidents in Familiar Surroundings.” In Julian Rosefeldt: Film Works, edited by Stephan Berg, Anselm Franke, Katerina Gregos, and David Thorp, 33–47. Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Verlag, 2008.

Metz, Christian. The Imaginary Signifier: Psychoanalysis and the Cinema, translated by Celia Britton, Annwyl Williams, Ben Brewster, and Alfred Guzzetti. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1982.

Münsterberg, Hugo. “Attention.” In Hugo Münsterberg on Film: The Photoplay: A Psychological Study and Other Writings, edited by Allan Langdale, 79–88. New York: Routledge, 2002.

Rezayazdi, Soheil. “Turning 13 Installation Screens of Cate Blanchett Into One Single-Screen Feature: Julian Rosefeldt on Manifesto.” Filmmaker Magazine (May 9, 2017). http://filmmakermagazine.com/102408-turning-13-installation-screens-of-cate-blanchett-into-one-single-screen-feature-julian-rosefeldt-on-manifesto/. Accessed December 23, 2017.

Westgeest, Helen. Video Art Theory: A Comparative Approach. Malaysia: Wiley-Blackwell, 2016.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i15.237 DOI: https://doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i15.237