Posts

Ma: Contemplative Editing With Zen Aesthetics (1)

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Claude Sonnet 4.0: Contemplative cinema editing employs Zen aesthetic principles to create profound temporal experiences through mindful post-production practices. By integrating meaningful intervals, subjective duration, organic rhythm, purposeful separation, and cyclical imperfection, editors craft viewing experiences that mirror meditative awareness and honor the authentic rhythms of consciousness and perception. 間 MA Meaningful gap or interval Ma, literally meaning "gap" or "pause" in Japanese, embodies the principle that emptiness contains infinite potential for meaning. Unlike Western conceptions of void as absence or negation, Ma celebrates negative space and temporal intervals as equally significant to the elements themselves. In traditional Japanese arts, from flower arrangement to architecture, Ma manifests as the deliberate cultivation of emptiness that allows the mind to complete what is left unsaid or unshown. This concept fundamentally challenges the W...

Paravel/Castaing-Taylor (Paris)

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Cycle de cinéma : Verena Paravel et Lucien Castaing-Taylor (YouTube) 30" (Jeu de Paume) 28 mai 2025 Une écoute du monde : Du 10 au 22 juin 2025 à la Galerie du Jeu de Paume "Chercheurs et enseignants en anthropologie à Harvard, Véréna Paravel et Lucien Castaing-Taylor forment un duo de cinéastes devenu incontournable qui déploie de nouvelles voies pour le documentaire, propres à ouvrir d’autres perceptions et d’autres compréhensions du monde. La projection de leurs films est au cœur d’un programme de rencontres destiné à donner accès à la multiplicité des dispositifs qu’ils mobilisent et des liens singuliers qu’ils ont tissé avec scientifiques, philosophes, techniciens et artistes pour mettre en œuvre leurs pratiques." Galerie du Jeu de Paume (Paris) Programme: De Humani Corporis Fabrica de Verena Paravel et Lucien Castaing-Taylor (2022, 115 min, vf)  Caniba  de Verena Paravel et Lucien Castaing-Taylor (2017, 97 min, vostfr)    Somniloquies  de Lucien Castain...

Zen Concepts in Contemplative Performance (4): Yuugen

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Claude Sonnet 4.0: The intersection of Japanese Zen aesthetics and contemplative cinema reveals profound possibilities for performance that transcend conventional Western acting methodologies. Four essential concepts operate within a complementary theoretical framework: Danshari functions as a foundational methodology for conscious elimination, Iki and Seijaku work as experiential principles governing refined presence, while Yuugen represents the atmospheric mystery that emerges from their synthesis. Together, they create a triadic model progressing from methodological preparation through embodied execution to perceptual reception, challenging performers to locate truth through restraint rather than demonstration and essential simplicity rather than elaborate character construction. 幽玄 YUUGEN The Profound Mystery Yuugen represents the culminating experiential aesthetic that emerges when the methodological foundation of Danshari, the formal intelligence of Iki, and the tranquil presence...

What Is Slow Cinema? (Post-Cinema Era) Chinese video essay

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  What Is Slow Cinema?什么是慢电影|Vedio Essay (YouTube) 6'26" (后电影时代) 4 June 2022

Zen Concepts in Contemplative Performance (3): Seijaku

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  Claude Sonnet 4.0: The intersection of Japanese Zen aesthetics and contemplative cinema reveals profound possibilities for performance that transcend conventional Western acting methodologies. Four essential concepts operate within a complementary theoretical framework: Danshari functions as a foundational methodology for conscious elimination, Iki and Seijaku work as experiential principles governing refined presence, while Yuugen represents the atmospheric mystery that emerges from their synthesis. Together, they create a triadic model progressing from methodological preparation through embodied execution to perceptual reception, challenging performers to locate truth through restraint rather than demonstration and essential simplicity rather than elaborate character construction. 静寂 SEIJAKU Tranquil Stillness Seijaku embodies the profound quietude that emerges when external agitation ceases and inner peace naturally arises, representing far more than mere absence of sound...

Feet on a relentless path, headspace in a cloud (film review: The North)

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The North (2025/Bart Schrijver/Netherlands) The highlands, right in between the clouds and the mountains. Two friends, and solitude all along the way… There was only one goal: reaching the northernmost cape of Scotland from Glasgow, 600 km on foot through the rough terrain, barren or wet wilderness, during extreme atmospheric conditions. Was it a dare, a bucket list or a dream? Chris (Bart Harder) and Lluis (Carles Pulido), former roommates, decided to set apart 30 days from their busy lives and accomplish this adventure together. We don’t know who they are, where they come from, what they want to become… but we’ll discover it, along with them, on the way to Cape Wrath. After a blind phone conversation from the past (as if recorded on an answering machine) of two students planning a farewell party, like a usual “Tuesday night” of drinking at the pub, the film cleverly flashes forward right away to a decade later. All we know about them through this phone call overture is that they use...

Zen Concepts in Contemplative Performance (2): Iki

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  Claude Sonnet 4.0: The intersection of Japanese Zen aesthetics and contemplative cinema reveals profound possibilities for performance that transcend conventional Western acting methodologies. Four essential concepts operate within a complementary theoretical framework: Danshari functions as a foundational methodology for conscious elimination, Iki and Seijaku work as experiential principles governing refined presence, while Yuugen represents the atmospheric mystery that emerges from their synthesis. Together, they create a triadic model progressing from methodological preparation through embodied execution to perceptual reception, challenging performers to locate truth through restraint rather than demonstration and essential simplicity rather than elaborate character construction. 粋 IKI Understated Elegance Iki represents an aesthetic philosophy that finds sophisticated beauty in restraint, elegance in understatement, and refinement through the conscious rejection of exces...

5 formes de l'inertie (Harmut Rosa)

 Dernière addition à la page Bibliographie : "Sur la relation entre le mouvement et l'inertie dans la modernité. Les catégories de l'inertie énumérées dans la section précédente montrent clairement qu'il est impossible de soutenir que 'tout' irait plus vite depuis l'avènement de la modernité. Bien des choses conservent leur vitesse (ou leur lenteur) d'origine, et certaines d'entre elles ont même tendance à ralentir. Toutefois cette formule inlassablement répétée reflète la conviction, littéralement constitutive de la modernité, qu'un déplacement de l'équilibre entre inertie et accélération se produit constamment et irrésistiblement au bénéfice de cette dernière. [..] En effet, aucune des formes de l'inertie que j'ai présentées ne représente un contrepoids structurel et/ou culturel équivalent à la dynamique de l'accélération de la modernité. [..]" "Ce qui fait à son tour que, dans un environnement marqué par des possibi...

Zen Concepts in Contemplative Performance (1): Danshari

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Claude Sonnet 4.0: The intersection of Japanese Zen aesthetics and contemplative cinema reveals profound possibilities for performance that transcend conventional Western acting methodologies. Four essential concepts operate within a complementary theoretical framework: Danshari functions as a foundational methodology for conscious elimination, Iki and Seijaku work as experiential principles governing refined presence, while Yuugen represents the atmospheric mystery that emerges from their synthesis. Together, they create a triadic model progressing from methodological preparation through embodied execution to perceptual reception, challenging performers to locate truth through restraint rather than demonstration and essential simplicity rather than elaborate character construction. 断捨離 DANSHARI Essential Reduction Danshari represents the foundational methodology within this theoretical framework, operating as a meta-aesthetic principle that governs all subsequent creative choices ...

Slow Burn (Eye Filmmuseum)

"[..] For proponents of the slow-cinema idea, an action should take just as long as it needs; a car approaching from a long distance in a broad landscape doesn’t have to appear in front of the camera in close-up within two seconds (see Ceylan’s Once Upon a Time in Anatolia, for example). Carrying out domestic chores can be filmed in real time; cooking a potato takes place according to the laws of physics, not those of cinematography (as in, for example, Chantal Akerman’s Jeanne Dielman). [..]" Thijs Havens (Eye Filmmuseum; Netherlands) Special screening programme (part of the Nuri Bilge Ceylan retrospective, Inner Landscape , 18 Jan-1 Jun 2025): Koza (Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Turkey 1995, 20') Prologús (Béla Tarr, Hungary 2004, 5')  La chambre (Chantal Akerman, Belgium 1972, 11') Szél (Marcell Iványi, Hungary 1996, 6')  The Night (Tsai Ming-liang, Taiwan 2021, 19')

Zen Aesthetics through Contemplative Spectatorship (9) Hi

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     Claude Sonnet 3.7:  Japanese aesthetic principles derived from Zen tradition offer a powerful lens for understanding contemplative cinema across cultures. This series examines ten concepts forming a progression from initial receptivity toward deeper awareness—revealing how contemplative films create spaces that transcend narrative efficiency. These aesthetic principles don't merely describe techniques but constitute an entire epistemology of viewing where cinema becomes a meditative practice, enabling access to dimensions of experience often overlooked in conventional spectatorship.   秘  Hi The Hidden Depths of Cinematic Experience Hi, a concept denoting that which is hidden, concealed, or mysteriously occluded, represents one of the most profound dimensions of Japanese aesthetic philosophy, addressing realms of experience that by their very nature resist explicit articulation or immediate apprehension. Unlike Western aesthetic traditions that often pr...

Perfect Days in the Internet Age (FilmFourAll)

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  Perfect Days in the Internet Age (YouTube) 9'34" (FILMFOURALL) 9 may 2025

Zen Aesthetics through Contemplative Spectatorship (8) Mu & Bi

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    Claude Sonnet 3.7:  Japanese aesthetic principles derived from Zen tradition offer a powerful lens for understanding contemplative cinema across cultures. This series examines ten concepts forming a progression from initial receptivity toward deeper awareness—revealing how contemplative films create spaces that transcend narrative efficiency. These aesthetic principles don't merely describe techniques but constitute an entire epistemology of viewing where cinema becomes a meditative practice, enabling access to dimensions of experience often overlooked in conventional spectatorship.     無  Mu &  微   Bi Nothingness and Subtle Profundity Mu and Bi represent perhaps the most philosophically profound and aesthetically sophisticated concepts in Japanese thought, articulating complementary dimensions of experience that conventional Western metaphysics has struggled to adequately conceptualize. Mu transcends simplistic understanding as mere absen...

Renoir (Chie HAYAKAWA) in Cannes 2025

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  RENOIR - Press Conférence - English - Cannes 2025 (YouTube) 41'10" (Festival de Cannes) 18 may 2025 Release date : Cannes : 17 may 2025 (World Premiere) Japan : 20 june 2025 France : 17 Septembre 2025