Close Up

25 March 2018: Colourmation: Deborah S Phillips & Karel Doing

capsicum-deborah-phillips.jpg

Berlin-based Deborah S Phillips works with a range of analogue media, including print, painting, collage and film: she is about to publish a catalogue covering thirty years’ work. Phillips has been researching the colours red, blue and green for over ten years: here she presents some of the results, in film and performance, including the world premiere of her “green” film, Im Grünen Bereich. Closing the evening, and in contrast to Phillips’ films, Karel Doing premieres his black and white work-in-progress Symbiogenesis.

Untitled Colourmation, Deborah S Phillips, 1992, 1 min, Colour, 16mm
Capsicum, Deborah S Phillips, 2008, 11 min, Colour, 16mm
T’chelet, Deborah S Phillips, 2014, 15 min, Colour, 16mm, slides & performance
Im Grünen Bereich, Deborah S Phillips, 2017, 13 min, Colour, 16mm
Symbiogenesis, Karel Doing, 2018, 20 min, B/W, 16mm, live vinyl cutting & performance   

Deborah Phillips' films are mostly short, and often very fragile. Layered, collage-like, fragmentary, they reflect her travels in many countries and her exploration of many cultures. Three films to be shown here make up the colour series – Capsicum (red), T’chelet (blue) and Im Grünen Bereich (green). These films pose questions about the nature of individual colours, and make all sorts of allusive references; they do not provide definitive statements. They are vibrant and playful. In fact, T’chelet is also a performance piece – with readings, slides and sometimes film loops – in which audience participation is welcome. Finally, Untitled Colourmation is an early painted animation film.

Karel Doing's Symbiogenesis consists of a series of repetitive and rhythmical musings on nature and culture, often superimposing the two. The image is one 16mm projection but the sound is a layering of optical (found) sound, a record specially cut for the occasion (played from the front of the cinema) and some sounds produced live (voice and small instruments). The title derives from the work of Lynn Margulis and to her notion that the convergence of species – rather than their divergence – is driving evolution.


More info:
www.deborahsp.wordpress.com
www.kareldoing.net