Film for music. Edgar Varèse and Bill Viola Cover Image

Filmy dla muzyki. Edgar Varèse i Bill Viola
Film for music. Edgar Varèse and Bill Viola

Author(s): Anno Mungen
Subject(s): Music, Cognitive Psychology, Film / Cinema / Cinematography, Sociology of Art
Published by: Uniwersytet Adama Mickiewicza
Keywords: film music; films made for music; animated film; spatial music; audiovisual perception;

Summary/Abstract: Anno Mungen focuses on “films made for music” and on the rare phenomenon of ‘music depicted by picture’ (S. Kracauer). The narration about historical metamorphoses of varied forms of coexistence between music and picture is accompanied by a reflection on the laws of audiovisual perception. The main examples are discussed, these concentrating on the artistic ideas of Walt Disney’s animated film Fantasia and – first of all – on Edgard Varèse’s bold ideal of spatial music, attained post mortem in Bill Viola’s Déserts (1994). After a detailed analysis of Viola’s film the author admits that the movie pictures deduced from music are able to render the latter its own substantial visual power.

  • Issue Year: 7/2009
  • Issue No: 13-14
  • Page Range: 29-45
  • Page Count: 17
  • Language: Polish