A leader of the structural film movement alongside Tony Conrad, Paul Sharits’s meticulous composition of his experimental films explored the materiality while investigating the limits of the frame and viewer’s perceptions. In N.O.T.H.I.N.G. (1968, 35 min.), Sharits alternates monochromatic frames in a symmetrical structure based on a Buddhist mandala to explore the physical limits of the film and the surface onto which it is projected. The shared sensibility of Sharits and Conrad is evidenced in Conrad’s Paul Sharits: Prescription and Shared Sensibility (1976, 31 min.), a recreation of a lecture on Sharits given by Conrad using nine cassette players to explore the dimensions of Paul Sharits’s use of score.
N.O.T.H.I.N.G. (1968), 35 min.
Paul Sharits: Prescription and Shared Sensibility (1976), 30:38 min.
Throughout his six-decade-long career, Tony Conrad forged his own path through numerous artistic movements, from Fluxus to the Pictures Generation, and beyond. Although best known for his pioneering contributions to both minimal music and structural film in the 1960s, Conrad helped to define a vast range of culture through his work, touching on everything from rock music and public television. Presented in conjunction with Introducing Tony Conrad: A Retrospective. On view from February 1 to August 11 at ICA, the first large-scale museum survey devoted to artworks Conrad presented in museum and gallery settings is part of an ongoing reappraisal of his creative life.
Check back soon for films screened on the following dates:
May 21
June 18
Image: Tony Conrad in front of Yellow Movie 2/2/73 (1973) and two Yellow Movie—35mm Format canvases (1973), in his retrospective exhibition, Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center, Buffalo, New York, December 1977. Photo: Kevin Noble. Yellow Movie 2/2/73 courtesy The Estate of Tony Conrad and Greene Naftali, New York. Image courtesy Tony Conrad Archives. Work © The Estate of Tony Conrad.
