Animation in its purest form. LIAF’s annual collection of the most impressive and expressive abstract and experimental animated films from all over the world. The programme includes Steven Woloshen’s (LIAF’s special guest) fantastic new cameraless masterpiece 1000 Plateaus (2004-2014) made entirely by hand and by scratching and painting images directly on to film stock.
At Barbican book tickets
Barcode III.0 (Adriaan Lokman, Netherlands)
Stereoscopic 3D
A unique journey across a topography created entirely from a form of digital light and shadow – a bristling terrain of poles bending the light in every direction.
2013, 8’15
1000 Plateaus (Steven Woloshen, Canada)
Made entirely in the front seat of a car with simple art tools direct to film, this hand-made short celebrates the joy of road maps, travel and jazz music.
2014, 3’20
Two Weeks – Two Minutes (Judith Poirier, Canada)
An intensely imaginative exploration of the way we interact with the opposing pages of a book, utilising a vast collection of lead and wood type to print directly onto film stock.
2013, 2’35
Rat Trap (Caleb Wood, US)
A short poem (“victims / descend / into holes / and reflect / and suffer”) an unsettling ambiance and a gripping horror story.
2013, 2’00
Storm (Lim Guo Jun, Singapore)
A delirious paean to Oskar Fischinger and Disney’s Fantasia – but with a 21st Century spin.
2013, 3’05
Pencil Test (David Ehrlich, US/China)
From line to surface, melody to harmony, purity to sensuality, from black and white to colour. A recent work from a master of the form.
2013, 3’25
Koukou (Takashi Ohashi, Japan)
Vocal calisthenics and an ultra stunning example of the art of synchronisation.
2013, 6’10
Triptych: Tripes, Entrails, Visceras (Pierre M. Trudeau, Canada)
Pirouetting through the innards of the boards, precious metals and wiring that make up our computers, this film works as an exploration into our informatics and electronic waste.
2012, 3’10
Third Page from the Sun (Theodore Ushev, Canada)
Three books: a film festival catalogue, a dictionary, the Bible. Three works whose materiality has become obsolete by the digital dematerialization. A commentary on the fragility of culture.
2014, 6’00
Bird Shit (Caleb Wood, US)
Sometimes, abstraction can be found in the everyday, right underneath your feet. In fact, sometimes it kind of finds you. You just have to look hard enough.
2013, 0’40
Picture Particles (Thorsten Fleisch, Germany)
Individual elements from a carrier of visual information have been isolated and used to construct alternative visual reagents. Repetition is administered as a binder to tame the wild particles in motion, achieving a golden ratio in the mind’s eye.
2014, 5’40
Circle Game (Patrick Jenkins, Canada)
A magical dance of circles generating a giddy mix of optical patterns.
2014, 1’00
Recycled (Lei Lei/Thomas Sauvin, China)
An exhaustively created moving image mural of Beijing and her inhabitants, painstakingly extracted from an archive of half a million 35mm negatives.
2014, 5’40
Machinalement (v.32) (JeanDetheux, Belgium)
“Listening with his eyes,” prolific Canadian filmmaker Jean Detheux has strived to create a piece that focuses on that sensitive and elusive space that can exist between music and images.
2013, 6’00
Wonder (Mirai Mizue, France/Japan)
This glorious 365-second animation is a sequence of 8,760 pictures hand-drawn over the course of 365 days! Colour and movement, tones and oscillations: pure rhythmic abstract animation.
2013, 8’00
