On May 23rd, Experimental collage filmmaker Kelly Sears will be presenting a presentation with a Q&A session at 29th Street Ballroom in Austin. Sears’ Films include: Once It Started It Could Not End Otherwise, Imprinted, Cover Me Alpha, Voice on the Line, The Body Besieged, Jean, The Believers, He Hates to be Second, The Drift, Angels Chant Like Witches, Devil’s Canyon, and Charles and Christopher.
I had a chance to view some of her work, and I was very impressed with her unique and dark style. She combines archival footage and stills with motion graphics (analog and digital), patterns, and minimalistic music and sound effects. One of my favorites is Voice on the Line, an layered mashup of vintage telephone operator footage, flickering wallpaper patterns and hypnotic voiceover.
Voice on the Line by Kelly Sears
Voice on the Line is a collage animation made from figures cut out of archival ephemeral films from the late 1950s. This animation mixes the history of these films with events of this era which results in a large scale secret operation that veers bizarrely off course. The film also reflects on current and troubled relationships between the areas of national security, civil liberties and telephone companies. Voice on the Line explores how technology can be used to shape our fears, desires and how we feel connected.
About Kelly Sears:
Experimental Response Cinema and 29th Street Ballroom host Galveston-based animator and filmmaker Kelly Sears, whose internationally-exhibited collage films are culled from discarded periodicals, books, archives, and orphan cinema. Drawing on experimental, documentary and narrative practices and featuring both analog and digital animation techniques, her films harness images of the past to reflect on the present. Q & A moderated by Caroline Koebel with Kelly Sears. http://www.kellysears.com/
