Documentary / USA / 60 Min / Digital High Definition

2013 Hudson West Productions

A stunning film…Davidson captures the unbridled visual energy of this under appreciated radical artist and pioneer of cinema. MARGARET PARSONS Head - Film Department, The National Gallery of Art Washington, DC A model of its genre! PHILIPPE-ALAIN MICHAUAD Curator of Film, Centre Georges Pompidou Paris

View demo scenes at www.hudsonwest.org/our-films/hansrichter

SYNOPSIS

Dadaist, radical provocateur, surrealist painter, pioneering filmmaker and visionary educator - Hans Richter was a major force in redefining art in the 20th Century, yet he remains largely unknown compared to his more illustrious peers. Richter is often misunderstood and undervalued for his contributions to making a new social art that forever changed the act of self–expression. The 60-minute documentary film HANS RICHTER: Everything Turns–Everything Revolves explores this enigma while charting Hans Richter’s epic journey through the century as he struggles to establish film as a unique art form. The story begins with a young Hans Richter at the center of generation of fiercely creative minds rebelling against the European aristocracy during World War I, when he joined the anarchic Dada movement at its inception with Tristan Tzara and Hans Arp. During the turbulent years between the wars, Richter collaborated with such luminaries as Sergei Eisenstein and Mies van der Rohe while making his own seminal experimental films including Rhythmus 21, Filmstudie, Everything Turns-Everything Revolves, Ghosts Before Breakfast and Inflation. Richter’s radical political ideas and passion for the avant-garde resulted in his exile from Germany where the Nazis labeled him a ʻdegenerate artistʼ. Finally, in 1940, on the eve of his arrest by police in Switzerland, Richter escaped from Europe, arriving in New York with little money and a limited command of English. Within a year he secured a teaching position at the newly formed Institute of Film Techniques at The City College of New York, arguably the first film production school in America. For the next 17 years, Richter was an influential figure to generations of American filmmakers, opening their eyes to documentary, experimental and European films the likes of which working class students from New York City had never seen. Some of the personalities who move through the Institute, including Woody Allen and Stanley Kubrick, went on to careers in mainstream cinema, but Richter’s lasting imprint is made on an emerging group of independent filmmakers in New York who became known collectively as The New American Cinema movement. Jonas Mekas, Shirley Clarke and Ken Jacobs followed Hans Richter’s passionate example to make film as art. In America, Hans Richter was also a magnet for a group of expatriate European artists whose lives have also been disrupted by World War II. His

friends Jean Cocteau, Max Ernst, Marcel Duchamp and Fernand Leger, along with his American-born neighbors Alexander Calder and Man Ray, made pilgrimages to Richter’s Connecticut studio and New York loft to collaborate with him on his surrealist films, Dreams That Money Can Buy (1946) and 8X8 (1958). More than quarter of a century after his death, Hans Richter remains a controversial figure in the history of modern art. His detractors maintain that he was simply a witness to history. HANS RICHTER: Everything Turns – Everything Revolves reveals that Hans Richter was a more nuanced, committed and visionary artist who actually transcended the notion of the “great man” theory. From his Dada roots to his later work, Richter was a galvanizing force who understood the power of creating a communal art with great social significance. Richter’s story is told in compelling episodes, ranging from near-death experiences to outrageously humorous encounters as he rides, and at times influences, the tides of the most tumultuous century in the history of art. The film features appearances by Marcel Duchamp, Jonas Mekas, Fernand Leger, Sergei Eisenstein, Man Ray, Cecile Starr, Jacqueline Matisse, Marion Von Hofacker, Timothy Benson, Standish Lawder, Tristan Tzara and Hans Richter. Everything Turns – Everything Revolves draws from rich aural and visual archives of rare film clips, stills and art works as well as recently discovered audio tapes of Hans Richter sharing his views on life and art.

 

DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT

Like a lot of eager film students in the 1970’s I was introduced to the world of experimental filmmaking in one massive life-changing dose - Jonas Mekas, Stan Brakhage and Maya Deren in the morning and Marcel Duchamp, Man Ray and Hans Richter in the afternoon. I distinctly remember the clashing and crashing rectangles in Richter’s Rhythmus 21 and the playfully surreal Ghosts Before Breakfast . In one day – two generations of avant garde films! This kind of work was smart, subversive and inspiring to a kid who had just inherited his father’s spring-wound Bolex camera.

It wasn’t until many years later, when I was teaching film at The City College of New York, that I realized it was Hans Richter who was the direct link between these two generations of adventurous filmmakers, transferring the spirit and aesthetic of the 1920s avant garde to that next generation. More than a figure from the past, Richter was actually in the United States in the ‘40s and ‘50s mentoring Mekas and the filmmakers who would become known collectively as The New American Cinema Movement - all of this from his perch as Director of the Institute of Film Techniques at the same City College of New York. Suddenly, I realized I was on sacred ground.

HANS RICHTER: Everything Turns – Everything Revolves began as an oral history project in 2005. I wanted to locate and interview as many graduates as I could. The Film Institute was closed under that name in 1966, when the college president declared that there was no room in a liberal arts curriculum for the study of film production (yes, it’s true). By that time Richter had already been retired for nine years, although he would film, paint and write for another decade. Under Richter, The Institute was the first college-level film program in America for the study of documentary film production. At first blush – it seems like somewhat of a mismatch have a documentary school run by a Dadaist, but Richter’s notion of poetic documentary was completely in harmony with the experimentation he had always been known for.

In my travels I discovered that it was not only experimental filmmakers that he mentored at the College, but also Oscar-winning producers, editors and cinematographers. Stanley Kubrick, Woody Allen and Nestor Almendros all took

classes. As I realized how all-pervasive Richter’s influence was in the U.S., I followed the thread back to his years in Europe. Astonishingly, Richter was collaborating with some of the most well-know artists and filmmakers of the 20th Century – Eisenstein, Tzara, Duchamp, Leger, Man Ray and Arp to name a few. (Many of these folks would later make appearances in his U.S. films as well). Gradually, the focus of my film on Richter at City College gave way to a full biography on Richter’s epic life. It simply refused to be relegated to back story. Richter was not only present but actively involved in so many critical moments like the birth of Zurich Dada with Tzara and Arp, the wild creative bacchanalia in La Sarraz with Eisenstein and the publication of the visionary design magazine “G” with Mies Van Der Rohe. He embodied the passion to make a new social art, including film, from the ashes of repressive 19th century culture. Largely through him, this energy was transferred to America when he finally fled from the Nazis to New York in 1941. The City College portion remains one of my favorites in the film, but it is now only 6 minutes long.

There is always a measure of uncertainty in portraying the work of an artist on screen. The tension between the need to tell the story and the responsibility to introduce the audience to the work of the subject is intense and the balance between the two is always elusive - at least for me. This stood out in even higher relief dealing with the work of Hans Richter, much of whose work was in film – a medium that unfolds through time. Whether a particular film was 3 minutes or 60 minutes, I could not show much more than 30 seconds on screen before needing to move on to the next chapter. I have made my peace – joyfully – by launching a parallel endeavor, Rescoring Richter. In this multiplatform project I have paired contemporary composers and sound artists with Richter’s iconic short films of the 1920s to create new sound settings. As influential as Richter was during his long and productive life, collaborating with his peers and mentoring his students, he now does a little time travel, collaborating through his images with another generation of artists. I am filming these “collaborations across time” and they will be shown as part of a combination screening, live performance and web event in 2015.

-Dave Davidson

 

 

 

 

FILMMAKER BIOGRAPHY

DAVE DAVIDSON Director / Producer Prior to the completing of HANS RICHTER: Everything Turns – Everything Revolves, independent filmmaker and media educator Dave Davidson, directed A Place Out of Time – The Bordentown School. The documentary, narrated by actress and civil rights activist Ruby Dee, tells the story of the elite all-black school that flourished for 70 years during the “Jim Crow” era and was abruptly closed in 1955 - a victim of the rush to integration. The film had its national prime time broadcast premiere on PBS in May 2010. In their review, The New York Times said, “Bittersweet humanity…. You could listen to a lot of windy history professors and still not learn as much about race issues in the century after the Civil War as you do in A Place Out of Time”. Davidson is Co-Producer and Director of Photography on Michael Feinstein’s American Songbook, a 9-part PBS series, directed by his partner in Hudson West Productions, Amber Edwards. Following successful seasons in 2010 and 2012, The 3rd and final season was broadcast in April 2013, featuring Liza Minnelli, Stephen Sondheim and Angela Lansbury. In 2012, Davidson received an NEA Art Works grant to produce Rescoring Richter, a multi-platform media project that brings together contemporary composers to create new scores for Hans Richter’s breakthrough avant-garde films of the 1920s. As a companion work to HANS RICHTER: Everything Turns – Everything Revolves, Rescoring Richter will culminate in a live screening event in late 2013, featuring the music of Alloy Orchestra, Bruce Odland , Lin Esser, The International Contemporary Ensemble with Phyllis Chen, Annea Lockwood and Vince Giordano and the Nighthawks along with short documentaries, directed by Davidson, that examine the creative process in these “collaborations across time” with the late Hans Richter. Davidson founded Hudson West Productions in 1985 and currently serves as President. For Hudson West, Davidson has directed numerous award-winning

films, including the nationally broadcast PBS documentaries Cissy Houston–Sweet Inspiration (“An exquisite documentary…This is the story of a woman who has thought deeply about the roots of black music.” - the Boston Globe) and The Dancing Man-Peg Leg Bates (“...provides a captivating portrait of Bates, but it does something more. It offers encouragement and salutes determination. The life of Peg leg Bates is an inspiration during Black History Month or any time at all” -The Kansas City Star). His documentaries have won film grants from The American Film Institute, The National Endowment For the Arts, NYSCA, The Prudential Foundation, The Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation and The NEH. Davidson won and Emmy Award in 1995 – 96 for Into The Light – The Furious Birth of The American Film Industry and has garnered numerous awards at international film festivals, including Chicago, Houston and Columbus. Davidson is Professor of Film at The City College of New York (City University of New York) in Harlem. At CCNY, he is the Founding Director of the MFA in Media Arts Production program—the only MFA production program of its kind in the largest media market in the world offered at an affordable/accessible public institution. During his years as Director (1997 to 2012) students from the program achieved worldwide recognition including winning 3 Student Academy Awards and 4 Student Emmys.

 

 

 

 

BRUCE ODLAND Composer Sonic thinker, composer, and sound artist, Bruce Odland is known for his large scale, public space sound installations which transform city noise into harmony, realtime. In 2004 he and Sam Auinger (O+A) altered the harmonic mix of the World Financial Center Plaza using the moon, tides, harmonic tuning tubes, and cement loudspeakers (Blue Moon). Together they have changed the sonic character of many public spaces around the world. His many collaborations include work with Laurie Anderson, Dan Graham, Andre Gregory, Wallace Shawn, Peter Sellars, Joanne Akailitis, Robert Woodruff, Tony Oursler, Peter Erskine, and the Wooster Group. He has contributed ideas and energy to projects in theatre, film, dance, public art, festivals, radio, and museums. His Sounds from the Vaults, a playable orchestra of virtual instruments for the Field Museum in Chicago, won the Gold Muse Award from the Association of American Museums. Recently his first indoor gallery show Hearing Space was shown, O+A’s Requiem for Fossil Fuels was performed to acclaim at Judson Memorial Church in NYC, and he toured as musical director of Wooster Group’s La Didone to the Edinburgh Festival. PAMELA RALAT Editor Pamela Ralat was recently named a finalist in the America Cinema Edtior’s Karen Schmeer Film Editing Fellowship for emerging documentary editors. She began her career as an apprentice to Oscar nominated editor, Peter Kinoy. Ralat is an Adjunct Professor at the City College of New York where she teaches documentary editing to graduate and undergraduate students. Ralat is currently editing the feature length documentary Toward The Great Whatever about composer/musician Rob Morsberger.

HERMAN LEW Director of Photography

Herman Lew’s extensive and diverse work as a cinematographer has been seen nationally and internationally and includes feature films, documentaries, commercials, music videos, dance, experimental, and museum installations. His recent camera work includes the documentaries Hans Richter – Everything Turns, Everything Revolves, The Alloy Orchestra – Filmstudie, Slaying the Dragon Reloaded, (En) Countering Bias, and Still, Present, Past. He is the recipient of a New York Foundation For The Arts Fellowship and has received grants from the New York State Council On The Arts for his own film and video projects. Lew is Associate Professor of Film and Video at The City College of New York, where he is the Director of the BFA Program. Since 1989 Lew has been the director of the nationally recognized Film & Video Production Workshop program at Third World Newsreel, the oldest progressive media organization in the country.

PAUL KOZEL Sound Design Paul Kozel is a music and audio technology educator and a professional recording/mixing engineer, sound designer, composer/arranger and studio designer. Since 1982, Kozel has been the director of the Sonic Art’s Center’s music and technology program at the City College of New York. His work in the professional arena has included projects for film, television and music production. His most recent project was providing the sound design, original music, dialog editing as well as mixing and recording for the PBS documentary A Place Out of Time: The Bordentown School narrated by Ruby Dee.  

 

SCREENINGS AND INSTALLATIONS

APRIL 2014

Berlin, Germany

Screening, Arsenal Institute for Film and Video, Curated by Deutsche Kinemathek, April 3rd, 2014

Berlin, Germany

Installation, Martin-Gropius-Bau, March 27-June 30, 2014

MARCH 2014

Washington, DC

Screening, The National Gallery of Art, March 15th, 2014

FEBRUARY 2014

New York, NY

Screening, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Bruno Walter Auditorium

February 25th, 2014

NOVEMBER 2013

Cologne, Germany

Screening, Soundtrack_Cologne, The Fritz Thyssen Striftung November 21, 2013  

 

OCTOBER 2013  

Metz, France Installation, Centre Pompidou-Metz, October 10, 2013-February 24, 2014

JUNE 2013 Pleasantville, NY

Screening, The Jacob Burns Film Center, June 26, 2013

MAY 2013

Los Angeles, CA

Installation, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Resnick Pavillion

May 3, 2013-September 2, 2013

Screening, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Leo S. Bing Theatre

May 5, 2013

MARCH 2013 Montreal, Canada

Screening, Official Selection, International Festival of Films on Art

March 22, 2013

 

 

 

FILM CREDITS

Producer & Director Dave Davidson

Editor Pamela Ralat Camera Herman Lew & Dave Davidson

Music Bruce Odland

Sound Design Paul Kozel

Digital Graphics Kellan Davidson

Additional Photography Phil Gries

Sound Mix Paul Kozel

Production Manager Dinah Davidson Consulting Editor Babak Rassi

Research Connie Honeycutt Production Assistant Annalisa Vozza

Archival Footage

MacDonald and Associates Cecile Starr Catarchive

INA The Philips Company Archives

Hans Richter Estate The Archives of the CCNY Archival Photographs Hans Richter Estate Bill Perlmutter Alan Pesetsky The Getty Archive The Museum of Modern Art Archives Cinematheque Suisse

Archival Audio Gideon Bachman The Museum of Modern Art Archives

Special Thanks To Amber Edwards

Erik de Bourdon Parme

Veronica Boswell Ursula Richter Lawder Hans Ruppel

Thanks To Adam Benn

Jeff Hoagland Harry Stendhal

Ning Lee Max Davidson

Tina Flemmerer Andrzej Krakowski

Holly Buechel Laura Cardona

Michelle Harvey April Gatling

Chihiro Amemiya

Larry Bank

Lisa Stiano-Coico

Brian Ackerman

The Jacob Burns Film Center Dave Budries Yvonne Zimmerman Lisa Staino-Choico Larry Bank Sydney Van Nort Pip Chodorov

Richard Salzberg Gregory Williams Stephen Chodorov

Funding The New York State Council on The Arts

The 21st Century Foundation City Seeds Grant

Copyright 2013 - Hudson West Productions  

 

 

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