On Calvino, bricks and brig

"...The Danish custom of hanging the replica of a sailing vessel in the church sanctuary is widespread in Denmark. It has two sources of origin. The custom of giving the replica of a ship to the sanctuary is very ancient. It can be traced back to pre-Christian times, when pagan belief taught that the offering of a miniature ship would assure a safe voyage for the real ship and its crew. Such a gift is called a "votive offering", and many a Viking family have built such replicas of the ships on which their husbands and sons set sail. This folk custom coincided with an ancient Christian metaphor of comparing the church itself to a ship. Even to this day, the main worship area in churches is called the "nave".."Sam Renseiw navigated a bit in a patterned world, where chip or pixel is replaced by brick, and met a larger brig than expected in the videographic space of this footage. View it by clicking here or try sitting on the chairs above (patafilm 115, 01'03'', 2.5 MB, )/ relinked 02.10.15

The retinex theory of color vision

"...But I wasn’t interested in those kinds of fetishistic objects; I’d rather have a cork on a string or a broken piece of wood. The appeal of an object for me has nothing to do with its age or material value, and even less to do with the fame of its former owner. Goethe was a great writer but also a great traveler and a manic collector..."

Sam Renseiw layering some simultaneity. Reminiscences of Grcic's Goethe exhibit, chairing out, with some soundings by Kelly Davis from up north. View the melting pot here or click on the yellow arte-fact above ( patafilm # 113, 01'14'', 2.4 MB, mov/quicktime )/ relinked 02.10.15

On pattern recognition

"...The front page opens, familiar as a friend's living room. A frame-grab from #48 serves as backdrop, dim and almost monochrome, no characters in view. This is one of the sequences that generate comparisons with Tarkovsky. She only knows Tarkovsky from stills, really, though she did once fall asleep during a screening of The Stalker, going under on an endless pan, the camera aimed straight down, in close-up, at a puddle on a ruined mosaic floor. But she is not one of those who think that much will be gained by analysis of the maker's imagined influences. The cult of the footage is rife with subcults, claiming every possible influence. Truffaut, Peckinpah ...."

Sam Renseiw's video examines the work of contemporary patterns that explore, in various ways, the human struggle to create and to understand our individual and collective identities. View it here or enter by clicking on the blue square above ( patafilm #112, 01'23'', 5.3 MB, mov/quicktime )

From headland to headland

"In the history of maritime intercourse there was a time when the timid seaman crept from port to port, feeling his cautious and wary way from headland to headland, and daring no distant voyage where seas, and winds, and rocks, unknown to him, increased the dangers of his uncertain life. Then a bolder race sprung up--tall ships danced proudly upon the waves, and many brave hearts manned and guided them; yet still they rarely ventured from sight of land."

Such is the view for todays inward panorama: Sam Renseiw, stranded, caught a tall ship, waiting. See it developp here or click on the hull above. ( patafilm # 111, 01'53'' , 3,7 MB, mov/quicktime ) / relinked 02.10.15

Oh Moon, why are you so contemporary

"..During our sojourn in the Belgian countryside we rehearsed and watched the fog. At night we all went to the well and sang and blew saxophones and trombones until unearthly columns of reverberated sound were generated. Suddenly, the Dutch guy's prized Ziljian cymbal fell, careening down off the walls to the endless bottom - beyond the Earth's center. We froze, the Music evaporated ; afterwards we listened back to the recording and howled and tried to imagine how that amazing cymbal would ever come to life again from inside the well.."
John Cage once said: 'Oh moon, why are you so contemporary ..." Sam Renseiw obliges with a short pataphysical video exerpt. View it here or click on the harpist above ( 00'50'', 1,7 MB mov/quicktime ) / link update 02.10.15

The identical nature of Being and Thought

"To follow nature" as Montaigne emphasizes after the Stoics: "I have taken, quite simply and crudely in my opinion, this ancient precept: that we can scarcely fail to follow nature, and that the sovereign precept is to accommodate oneself to it. I have not, as did Socrates, corrected by the force of reason my natural impressions, neither have I troubled my inclination with art. I let myself go forward just as I have come along in the past; I fight against nothing..."

Sam Renseiw takes you back to the year 425 B.C.: Plato was born when Parmenides the Eleate proclaimed identical the nature of Being and Thought, essence and intellection, the object of thought and the act of thinking, a charged notion with serious implications for the future of videoblogging.. View the abbreviated implications here or enter on the astonishing scope above ( 00'.46'' 2.2 MB mov/mp4 quicktime) / link updated