Avant Garde Blogathon

...underway, as we speak! hosted by Girish, who has a post up about Joseph Cornell, an artist I like very much. The only film of his I have seen is Rose Hobart - a fascinating film constructed out of clips from East of Borneo - no slouch itself in the surrealism department (I refer you to Guy Maddin's review for the Village Voice.) But for a movie geek like me, Cornell's art has cinematic qualities - using cinematic source material (Penny Arcade Portrait of Lauren Bacall), but also all those grids and repetitions reminiscent of film strips, or Mubridge. (A quality he shares with Warhol.) Look at that Bacall box: the grids, repeated images, even the holes around the boxes at the top, enough like sprocket holes for me. The formal elements - grids, repetitions, etc. - are fundamental to Cornell's work, and hard not to associate with film. The "window" box at the bottom here - would make a pretty good strip of avant-garde film.

I wish I had more to offer to this blogathon - check it out, there's some good reading there.