On FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 28th, at 7pm, join us at the FMC Screening Room (475 Park Avenue South, 6th Floor) for a program of films celebrating the legacy of prolific filmmaker and composer Jon Behrens.

Curated by Kornelia Boczkowska, this program celebrates the vast legacy of one of the Northwest’s most prolific filmmakers and composers, Seattle-based Jon Behrens (1964-2022), showcasing his unique experiments with image, sound, and celluloid. From cinematic abstractions and silent studies in light, color, and water, to landscapes, cityscapes, NASA images, and Hollywood movies, this program demonstrates a remarkable diversity of Behrens’ films, which are both simple and complex, lyrical and psychedelic, as well as mediative and visually challenging. Since the late 1970s, Behrens made well over 100 films using different formats, styles, and approaches, ranging from short documentaries, narratives, and diaries, to found footage, hand-painted, and optically-printed films. Behrens’ work is a living proof of his genuine love and passion for experimental film, his lifelong mission of supporting analog filmmakers, and his numerous contributions to the filmmaking community through the Interbay Cinema Society, the Lightpress Grants program, Engauge Experimental Film Festival, and other initiatives. The program features a selection of Behrens’ films and his three unreleased films.

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Jon Behrens (born May 12, 1964, in Eugene, OR; died in Seattle, WA, September 5, 2022) was a prolific, dedicated, self-taught filmmaker and composer whose career spanned more than four decades. Behrens founded the Interbay Cinema Society, the Engauge Experimental Film Festival and the Lightpress Grants program.

Kornelia Boczkowska, PhD (AMU, Poznan) is a scholar, curator, and educator with a special interest in American avant-garde cinema. She has received several research grants and is the author of two books and over forty other publications on independent, experimental, and documentary (avant-doc) film.

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PROGRAM:

Part I: Landscapes and Cityscapes

In the Autumn Before the Winter Comes Man’s Last Mad Surge of Youth

16mm to digital, color, sound, 3 min, 2019

Optically printed fragments of film Jon Behrens shot during the autumn months in response to seeing some of Caryn Cline’s films. Caryn re-introduced Jon to shooting films outside.

Light Color and Water

16mm to digital, color, silent, 1 min, 1987

A silent mediation on light, color and water and one of Jon Behrens’ earliest released films.

Undercurrents

16mm to digital, color, sound, 9 min, 1994

The third and final installment of Jon Behrens’ Urban Landscape Series and his personal favorite of the three. RUBATO provided the soundtrack.

Viaduct

16mm to digital, color, sound, 7 min, 2020

A loving look back on a Seattle icon that is no longer there.

One Minute Movie No. 1

16mm to digital, color, sound, 1 min, 2013

Jon Behrens’ unreleased one-shot city film.

The Colors of Boulder in the Summer

16mm to digital, color, sound, 6 min, 2015

In the summer of 1997, Jon Behrens went to Boulder Colorado for a holiday and shot little bursts of images along the way.

Part II: Experiments in Found Footage

Difficult Cinema

16mm to digital, color, sound, 6 min, 1993

A film made by taking scraps of film from other projects and some found footage. The footage was chopped up into very short sections and then cut all back together again at random with hand painting sections and sections with the emulsion bleached off of the film. The Soviet France provided the soundtrack.

Fluffy Fluffy Calm Calm

16mm to digital, b&w, silent, 7 min, 1998

The story of the week in the life of an eyeball.

Atomic Theory and Chemistry

16mm to digital, color, sound, 5 min, 2012

Jon Behrens’ experiment with incorporating NASA found footage into his hand painted and optical printing filmmaking using jelled light, a variety of colors and Behrens’ own sound design.

Found Footage Film

16mm to digital, color, sound, 2 min, 2017

A film made up from discarded trailers from Hollywood movies from the early 1990’s.

Part III: Experiments in Hand-Painted Footage

Bipacking Experiments No 1

16mm to digital, color, silent, 2 min, 1999

Jon Behrens’ unreleased hand painted film.

Anomalies of the Unconscious

16mm to digital, color, sound, 11 min, 2003

An entirely hand painted, manipulated and step printed film and the second instalment of the Anomalies Cycle when Jon Behrens began experimenting more with other colors and different textures. The soundtrack was performed by NEGATIVLAND.

Retina Circus

16mm to digital, color, sound, 3 min, 2014

Jon Behrens’ unreleased hand painted, manipulated and optically printed found footage film.

My Stars

16mm to digital, color, sound, 2 min, 2021

A film using found 35mm footage: painted, manipulated and optically printed.

Part IV: Analog Dreaming

Modular on the Spot

16mm to digital, color, sound, 3 min, 2017

Jon Behrens’ unedited film shot at Gas Works Park on July 16, 2016, with his newly acquired Arriflex camera.

I Love Synthesizers

16mm to digital, color, sound, 6 min, 2016

A music video and promotional film for Vinegar Syndrome, the “sound arm” of Jon Behrens’ creativity. Composed of images of Behrens’ gear and unused footage from his unreleased projects. With improvised sound.

Total Run Time: 74 minutes.