Un autre qu’on ajoute à la liste :
Fuck Yeah Altars : Altars, shrines, and other sacred spaces from all traditions and spiritual paths
D’autres mondes
Jan Kounen, France, 2004, 76 Min
‘Alors qu’il tourne Blueberry, l’expérience secrète, Jan Kounen rencontre les guérisseurs Shipibo d’Amazonie péruvienne et découvre leur plante sacrée : l’Ayahuasca, la liane des esprits.
Extrêmement marqué par cette expérience, il décide de revenir au Pérou afin de tourner un documentaire sur la plante et les rites médicinaux des chamans. Pour cela il filme les autochtone mais va aussi rencontrer des neurologues, philosophes, artistes, chimistes, etc. travaillant sur ce sujet. Il interroge notamment le dessinateur Jean Giraud ou Kary Mullis, prix Nobel de chimie 1993.
Plus qu’un documentaire traditionnel, le film se veut une invitation à un voyage, une porte entrouverte sur un autre monde : une autre perception du réel.‘ – WIKI
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Altered States (1980) by KEN RUSSELL (ici)
High Society: A History of Mind-Altering Drugs (ici)
Le cerveau mystique (2006) par ISABELLE RAYNAULD (ici)
The Gardener of Eden (1981) by JAMES BROUGHTON (ici)
Alex Grey
The Occult Experience
Frank Heimans, United States, Australia, 1985, 87 min
‘An examination of occultism as practiced in different parts of the world’
L’Europe des esprits ou la fascination de l’occulte, 1750-1950 est une exposition pluridisciplinaire qui explore l’emprise de l’occulte chez les artistes, penseurs, écrivains et savants, dans toute l’Europe, au fil des époques décisives de l’histoire de la modernité. L’exposition est organisée en trois volets qui traitent respectivement :
- de la création artistique (peinture, dessin, sculpture, gravure et photographie) et littéraire surgie de l’irrationnel et de l’obscur,
- de la tradition ésotérique revisitée dans une vaste perspective chronologique qui embrasse ses textes fondateurs et son iconographie imprimée,
- des relations entre phénomènes occultes et science, à travers l’évocation de figures de savants et d’expériences et la présentation d’instruments scientifiques
Réunissant quelque 500 œuvres, 150 objets scientifiques, 150 livres et une centaine de documents, provenant de nombreux pays européens, L’Europe des Esprits se développe au sein du Musée d’Art moderne et contemporain de la Ville de Strasbourg sur plus de 2500 m².
Présenté jusqu’au 12 février 2012.
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Secrets of the Occult (2007) by DAN BURSTEIN (ici)
The Museum of Icelandic Sorcery & Witchcraft in Hólmavík, Iceland (ici)
The Museum Of Witchcraft in Boscastle (UK) in the late 1960′s (ici)
The Alchemy of Things Unknown (ici)
Amateurs de lignes, de diagrammes, de Paul Laffoley ou de kabbale ésotérique occidentale vous en serez enchanté :
‘Smith’s drawings are vibrant, esoteric, beautiful, and inspired diagrams that hearken back to the tradition of alchemical art of the seventeenth century. While invoking memories of such amazing drawings, his work also goes beyond and extends this tradition.’ (Occult Of Personality)
David Chaim Smith (b.1964) is an artist and writer based in Brooklyn, New York.
1964: born in Queens New York City
1980-1982: philosophy and art history at Queens College
1982-1986: BFA in drawing at Rhode Island School of Design
1988-1989: MFA in drawing at Colombia University
1990: beginning of intensive study of alchemy and Western Esoteric Qabalah
1990-1997: ritual work and study with several western occult orders
1997: all activity in visual art suspended in favor of practical mysticism
1997-1998: residence at Crazy Cloud Hermitage
1998-2006: immersion in Chassidic mysticism and traditional Hebrew Kabbalah
2007: innovation of a set of graphic keys based on the 13th century mystical text ”Maayin HaChochmah”. Image making is resumed after 10 year hiatus.
American Mystic
Alex Mar, USA, 2010, 80 min
Set against a vivid backdrop of bucolic rural landscapes, American Mystic weaves together the stories of three young Americans exploring alternative religion. Chuck is a Native American sundancer and new father striving to balance his religious practice and family responsibilities in the South Dakota badlands; Morpheus is a pagan priestess who finds spirituality in the earthy terrain of California mining country; and Kublai explores Spiritualism in upstate New York, a modern incarnation of the area’s storied history of religious revivalism.
Alex Mar’s meditative documentary artfully sews together its subjects’ introspections with the landscapes of their quintessentially American districts. Their reflections are intercut with their work on the farm, drives along deserted highway, and hikes through mountain vistas. Gently applying these tropes of Americana to her story of fringe communities, Mar crafts a poetic tapestry of religious plurality, serving as a complement to prevalent depictions of religious America as homogenous and Christian. Chuck, Morpheus, and Kublai pursue religious insight in disparate, exceptional ways, but are united in a uniquely American vision of transcendence (TribecaFilm.com)
… “A dream world, a world of magic and ritual, yet there are images there of the burning cars and radar systems, which remind you there is a price to be paid in order to gain this dream in the face of a world of violence” …
The Angelic Conversation
Derek Jarman, UK, 1985, 77 min
The Angelic Conversation is a 1985 arthouse drama film directed by Derek Jarman. Its tone is set by the juxtaposition of slow moving photographic images and Shakespeare’s sonnets read by Judi Dench – WIKI
The soundtrack to the film was composed and performed by Coil, and it was released as an album of the same title :
Coil ‘The Angelic Conversation‘ (1994)
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Coil ‘Heartworms’, images taken from ‘Garden of Luxor‘ (1972) by DEREK JARMAN (here)
Journey to avebury (1971) de DEREK JARMAN (here)
In the Shadow of the Sun (1980) by DEREK JARMAN (here)
T.G.: Psychic Rally in Heaven (1981) by DEREK JARMAN (here)
John Dee, Queen Elizabeth’s Magician
Produced by Channel 4, UK, 2002, 52 min
‘John Dee, Queen Elizabeth’s Magician is a 2002 television show produced by the UK’s Channel 4 for their Masters of Darkness series, and tells the man’s incredible story in a much more accessible way. While perhaps not revealing anything that the more avid Dee student wouldn’t already know, the show is informative and entertaining (if slightly cheesy) and serves as a good introduction to the man and his legacy. It’s also a good watch for fans of Alan Moore, who appears throughout the show and talks of Dee’s magical practices and their influence’ …
Elemental 7
Chris Carter, Cosey Fanni Tutti & John Lacey, UK, 1983, 59 Min
“All pieces were composed and played by Chris Carter, Cosey Fanni Tutti and John Lacey, recorded in 1982 and completed in 1983″ …
… ‘Each piece from this video is a story in itself, each saying something different. The music was recorded specifically with each piece in mind, the visual came first. It is not a ‘pop promo’ video’ …
‘Video production is within anyone’s reach, the only limit being your imagination’ …
Coil ‘Heartworms‘ tirée de la compilation Terra Serpentes (1996).
Vidéo réalisé à partir d’images du film ‘Garden of Luxor‘ (1972) de Derek Jarman.
‘There’s too much blood in my alcohol’
Journey to avebury
Derek Jarman, UK, 1971, 10 min
‘Coil‘s “Journey to Avebury” was a ten-minute soundtrack made for a pre-existing Derek Jarman film, recorded in the early-mid 90s and never officially released …
… The short film doesn’t just record a visit to a historical (indeed, pre-historical) site; it is a piece of history itself, shot on Super 8 within Jarman’s first year of film-making (1971) and an obvious product of the period’s counter-cultural interest in occult secrets and mystical traditions. This is a film about the English countryside that seems rapturous in its appreciation, and it reminds you that for all of Jarman’s antagonism to the dominant British culture – especially during that grim stretch known as Thatcherism – it’s easy to put him within a group of ultra-English artists and mystics: your William Blakes, your John Dees, your Peter Ackroyds’ (ici) …
#Jaune, #Photographie, #Peinture, #Territoire
In the Shadow of the Sun
Derek Jarman, UK, 1980, 54 min
… ‘A Derek Jarman film with music by Throbbing Gristle. Derek Jarman used some of his 70s home movie footage to produce this wonderful piece of exploitational avantgarde cinema.
Actually the original material has been slowed down to a speed of 3-6 frames, then Jarman added colour effects and the pulsating, menacing score by Industrial supergroup Throbbing Gristle. The result is a piece of art not to dissimilar to Jarman’s painting work in using found footage as elements of memory and mind that resemble ideas reflected in the Cabala and in C.G. Jung’s writings about an archetypical past that is hidden in everyone of us. The first In the Shadow of the Sun (1974-80), was originally put together by Jarman himself in 1974 from re-shot Super-8 material including footage from Tarot (aka the Magician, 1972) and A Journey to Avebury (1971), amongst several others.
The film was eventually blown-up to 35mm and premiered at the 1981 Berlin Film Festival. The focus on ritual, mysticism and obscure alchemical symbolism links it with the work of Anger. However, Jarman’s preference for the work of Carl Jung and the “white” magician John Dee, is quite distinct from Anger’s invocations of the “black” magician A. Crowley‘ …
T.G.: Psychic Rally in Heaven
Derek Jarman, UK, 1981, 8 min
Soundtrack by Throbbing Gristle (“Maggot Death – Live At Rat Club” from the album The Second Annual Report).
… ‘It features footage from a live performance and unintelligible visual noise, rhythmically interspersed to produce a throbbing effect’.
Loch Ness Magick
Brian Butler, USA, 2008, 9 min 21 sec
‘A magical ritual on the grounds of Aleister Crowley’s Boleskine House in Loch Ness. This house was later owned by Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin.’
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THE VISION AND THE VOICE: THE CINEMA OF THE OCCULT
“Magick is the Science of understanding oneself and one’s conditions. It is the Art of applying that understanding in action.” – Aleister Crowley (Magick in Theory and Practice)
Not long since its inception the cinematic picture has been utilized to express both positive and negative sentiments towards the varied mystical traditions practiced in our present and our past. This is a list for those artists who have put forth questions or symbols alluding to mysticism, the esoteric, and occultism into their work as well as those who utilize the medium as an extension of their personal rituals and systems of practice. Read.