Stones

Steine (Stones) is a documentary film on a sculptor’s symposium in St. Margarethen, Burgenland. Behind this short description of content lies one of the most intelligently filmed and concepted documentary films in the history of Austrian film. The date of the last showing of this film could not be reconstructed.
Through examining another type of art - sculpture - Schmidt begins his discourse on the art of film. The macro-structure is conventional: journey, arrival, an official tour, the subjects nature and culture, the artists at work, a "dialogue" with the individual pieces, and finally the dialogue between film and stone. Along with its documentary ambitions, the film poses the explicit question on what the mimetic function of art is (...). Schmidt leaves being abstract up to the sculptors in the film, while he himself remains in a representational mode. The question of Schmidt's film is: "How to represent?" The function of depictionary representation has still been assigned to this film, it has not yet (as in Schmidt's later films) become material in itself. (Peter Tscherkassy in: (eds.) Horwath/Ponger/Schlemmer, Avantgardefilm Österreich. 1950 bis heute, Vienna 1995)

Orig. Title
Steine
Year
1964 - 1965
Country
Austria
Duration
30 min
Category
Avantgarde/Arts
Orig. Language
not specified
Downloads
Stones (Image)
Stones (Image)
Stones (Image)
Credits
Director
Ernst Schmidt jr.
Script
Ernst Schmidt jr.
Cinematography
Walter Funda
Music
Dieter Glawischnig, Ewald Oberleitner
Text Author
Günter Falk, Harald Sauter
Narrator
Hermann Treusch
Executive Producer
Anton Farber
Available Formats
16 mm (Original Format)
Aspect Ratio
1:1,37
Sound Format
mono
Frame Rate
24 fps
Color Format
b/w
DCP 2K (Distribution Copy)
Aspect Ratio
1:1,33
Sound Format
mono
Color Format
b/w
Digital File (prores, h264) (Distribution Copy)