Michael Snow + Robbrecht Desmet

Michael Snow’s Wavelength consists of a 45-minute cinematic exploration of a loft, which starts with a long shot that shows the whole space and ends with a close shot of a photo on the wall between two windows. This optical trajectory is accompanied by a gradually changing electronic sound signal that also marks the passage of time. Small events – the moving of a closet, a telephone call – evoke a murder mystery. Wavelength is exemplary of the Structural Cinema and the way it uses architecture to indicate the stability of the image and the passing of time and light.

In Boekentoren, Robbrecht Desmet also explores a single room, in this case by using the 360° shot, a so-called anti-cinematographic gesture that goes against the spatial logic of classical cinema, but that just like the zoom is an embodiment of the curious device of simultaneous inscription and erasure. The film portrays the belvédère of the Boekentoren, Ghent’s university library, built by Flemish modernist Henry Van De Velde. In a continuous panoramic shot, taken from the centre of the interior, the camera scans both the modernist wooden pillars as the stark windows framing the city skyline and Ghent’s historic towers.

In collaboration with the Bachelor in Art History, Musicology and Theatre Studies (UGent) and the Master in Theatre and Film Studies (UAntwerp)

In the presence of Steven Jacobs, curator of the film program