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Collectif Jeune Cinéma – Glitch film: Mapping the Black Box, curated by Ejla Kovačević
“Take a familiar piece of technology and do something unfamiliar with it”—this is how Nick Briz described the basic formula of glitch art in one of his hypermedia essays. While this formulation helped articulate a new wave of digital artivism in the early 2010s, it echoes strategies long present in artistic practices—from the avant-garde of the 1920s, to experimental filmmakers of the 1960s, and video artists of the 1970s. Building on this legacy, a new generation critically engages with the (post-)digital media landscape, particularly challenging the technocapitalist ideology of functionality, political neutrality, and immateriality that keeps users in the position of passive consumers.
Conceived as an ongoing exploration of audiovisual works belonging to a broader “counter-history of technological disobedience” (Nicole Brenez, Bidhan Jacobs (2010). Le cinéma critique: De l’argentique au numérique, voies et formes de l’objection visuelle. Publications de la Sorbonne, Paris), the programme presents six formally distinct films that analyze and expose the mechanisms of black boxes.
The works range from the material substrate of photochemical and analog imagery (Johanne Vaude, Ignacio Tamarit, Sabrina Ratté), to unauthorized and hidden surveillance enacted by mobile applications and algorithms upon the body (Occitane Lacurie), from video game–mediated psychosis (Jarod Unofisal), to the ecological crisis that reveals the very tangible consequences of supposedly “invisible” digital technologies (Jacques Perconte).
All selected works are part of the catalogue of Collectif Jeune Cinéma, the first film cooperative dedicated to independent experimental cinema, founded in Paris in 1971. Since 1999, it has also organized the Festival des cinémas différents et expérimentaux.
After the screening join us for a short online discussion with Ejla Kovačević.
Jarod Unofisal - “R@g3_qu1TTe”, 2018, FR, 7', HD videoIgnacio Tamarit - “In Film/On Video”, 2018, AR, 3', 16mm > HD videoSabrina Ratté - “Afterimage Selves”, 2014, CA, 4', HD videoOccitane Lacurie - “Xena's Body - A Menstrual Auto-Investigation using an Iphone”, 2024, FR, 11', HD videoJohanna Vaude - “Totalité Remix”, 2005, FR, 7' , Super8/video > HD videoJacques Perconte - Avant l’effondrement du Mont Blanc (Before the Collapse of Mont Blanc)”, 2020, FR, 16', DCP
Ejla Kovačević is a film critic, curator, and researcher in the field of experimental cinema. She is a member and curator at the film cooperative Collectif Jeune Cinéma, as well as the co-artistic director of the Festival of Different and Experimental Cinema in Paris (Festival des cinémas différents et expérimentaux). She is a PhD candidate in film studies and a lecturer at Paris 8 Vincennes–Saint-Denis University, where she researches the politics and aesthetics of independent film collectives, with a particular focus on photochemical and digital glitch practices in contemporary experimental film.
www.estca.univ-paris8.fr/ejla-kovacevic
