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Unfolding in a roughly chronological order, 50 Years of Solitude is a sketch portrait of the variety and depth of work in the experimental tradition by Winnipeg Film Group members – from the very beginnings to the present. Curated by James Pomeroy.James Pomeroy is a Winnipeg based film maker, photographer, teacher, and a senior member of the Winnipeg Film Group. He has taught for the Philosophy department and the School of Art at the University of Manitoba. His work is concerned with investigations into colour and rhythm, structure and materiality, and improvisation and analogies between music and film. His work has been screened nationally at venues/ events such as The Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s New Music Festival, The National Arts Centre Ottawa, L’Alternativa, The European Media Arts Festival, The Experimental Art Gallery at The India Habitat Centre, The Kuala Lumpur Film, Video and Music festival (KLEX) , Festival Silêncio, and a bar in Bangkok.
okeedoke
Dir. Leon Johnson
3:00 | Experimental | Colour | January 1973
A portrait of the filmmaker’s former brother-in-law, Steve Jackson, with psychedelic photograph animation synchronized to music performed by Chuck Aliamo.
The West Quarter
Dir. Joanne Jackson Johnson
4:00 | Documentary | B&W | January 1974
“When I stepped into the field of sunflowers I realized that I was in another world. I could no longer see the surrounding fields and road. It was like walking through a dense forest. I had never seen that many tall sunflowers close up before and didn’t realize at the time that it wouldn’t be long before these giants would no longer be grown, replaced by dwarf varieties. The film is about the experience of being in that field, abstracted by the black and white film, with music composed by Bill Hinkley, who played for years on Garrison Keillor’s The Prairie Home Companion show.”
A Monster Loose in the City
Dir. Gregory Zbitnew
4:00 | Narrative/Fiction / Comedy | Colour | January 1979
A bizarre and humorous pastiche of images and narrative decrying the monster let loose in our minds, our homes and our cities almost every night between 7 and 10 (and sometimes during the day as well).
5¢ a Copy
Dir. Gregory Zbitnew, Ed Ackerman
2:52 | Animation | B&W | January 1980
An innovative experimental animated film that makes moving images with a photocopy machine. Through bizarre images and a pulsing electronic musical score, the filmmakers have created a mind expanding work that will long remain in your memory.
Hollands New Queen
Dir. Grant Guy
3:00 | Experimental | Colour | January 1984
Visual images that confront us daily are in constant flux. Only traces of their existence remain in our conscious thoughts.
Bite
Dir. MB Duggan
0:01 | Experimental | Colour | January 1985
A car, water, an arm, a poem, titles, and credits. At one second, the world’s shortest film.
Odilon Redon: The Eye Like a Strange Balloon Mounts Towards Infinity (2008)
Dir. Guy Maddin
6:00 | Experimental | B&W | January 2008
Keller, an old sub-aquatic locomotive engineer, and his son Caelum witness a train collision and rescue from its wreckage Berenice, an orphaned pre-adolescent girl-snail. Keller and Caelum adopt Berenice as a member of their family. Keller even names his beloved steam engine after his “daughter”.
When Berenice reaches puberty, both Keller and Caelum fall in love with her, becoming romantic rivals. A disturbed Berenice runs away to marry a Zepplin pilot, only to be kidnapped by her adoptive father. Keller is blinded in a train mishap. Caelum loses his head and turns into a flower. Berenice turns into a cactus.
French Ship
Dir. Carole O’Brien
3:30 | Experimental | Colour, B&W | September 2003
Techniques: Scratch Animation, Hand Process (b&w), Hand Process (col)
In a fishing village, a woman waits anxiously. Will her men return safely? She summons visions of past expectations and calls on her courage.
Winged Victory
Dir. Victoria Prince
7:40 | Experimental / Animation | Colour, B&W | March 2006
Techniques: Scratch Animation, Hand Process (b&w)
Language: English
Step right up Ladies and Gentlemen, Step right up! Presenting Winged Victory, an over-the-Big-Top experimental, silent-era-styled, hand-processed, scratch animation. Set in a Circus Ring, a Chicken Lady dreams of being the main stage flying trapeze act. Constantly taunted and teased by scratch-animated clowns and a whip-wielding Ringmaster, there is only one way for her to achieve victory…a death defying act.
Tariffica Synthany No. 1
Dir. Robert Pasternak
2:00 | Experimental | Colour | March 2008
Each frame of this rich black, grey and white video looks like an abstract expressionist painting following the path of tar lines on the road in a continual vertical movement as they sway side to side, and mingle with the white lines phasing on and off screen. Set over a background of stacatto concrete sounds composed by the filmmaker.
(This film was commissioned by the Winnipeg Film Group’s Cinematheque for its 25th anniversary, Silverscope)
The Great Divide
Dir. Bryan Besant
3:24 | Experimental | B&W | May 2008
The Great Divide was created as a collaboration with Japanese artist Katsuyuki Hattori, and performed live as part of a video concert. The work is composed of video footage of the Arlington Bridge which sprawls over the often debated train yard and grain transportation depot which segregates the North End of Winnipeg from the rest of the city. This work, Besant’s first attempt at generating audio from video, was inspired by the geometric form of the bridge. It has become something of a tutorial on the sounds generated by contrast and movement, and yet the overall feel of the piece seems to reflect the uncertainty of the politics and disjointed debate to move the train yard out of the city.
Tattoo Step
Dir. Mike Maryniuk
1:30 | Experimental / Animation | Colour | January 2008
Temporary Tattoos applied to 35mm for eternity. An energetic conjuring of Manitoban spirits. Starring: Haunted HyperActive Hypnotists and Breakneck Butterfly Barfbags.
Sitka
Dir. Olya Zikrata
4:45 | Experimental | B&W | January 2009
Techniques: Hand Process (b&w)
Memories are awash in a haptic eroticism of film grain.
Sitka (“net” in Ukrainian) is composed of threads and ruptures into the folds of memory, love, and loss. Body, skin, touch, movement, man and woman, mother and son, memories are awash in a haptic eroticism of film grain. With use of overexposure, vaseline, hand-processing, and flashes of light, this film asks for a close, haptic viewing.
The Story of Thomas Edison
Dir. Aaron Zeghers
4:38 | Experimental / Animation | Colour | September 2011
Techniques: Scratch Animation, Hand Process (b&w), Hand Process (col), Optically Printed
Language: English
A film about the childhood heroes you so admired and now don’t speak to. Optically printed onto 16mm, The Story of Thomas Edison is a mélange of recorded audio bites that form a libelous biography of the famous inventor.
Notes on Gesture
Dir. Solomon Nagler
4:33 | Experimental | B&W | January 2010
Techniques: Hand Process (b&w)
Language: English
A visual essay of indexical failures that examine the bliss of ineffable gestures…
Sins of the Father
Dir. Deco Dawson
4:20 | Experimental / Narrative/Fiction | B&W | October 2011
Language: English
Paying homage to the 1955 masterpiece Night of the Hunter, Deco Dawson has created a collage film using childlike miniatures, in-camera effects, 16mm footage of abandoned houses and a meticulous sound design that captures the eerie doom of the original.
Wingdings Love Letter
Dir. Scott Fitzpatrick
1:54 | Experimental / Animation | Colour | 2011
Techniques: Direct animation, 16mm
noun \ˈwiŋ-ˌdiŋ\
1. A lavish or lively party or celebration.
2. A real or pretended fit or seizure; a rage.
An ode to a misunderstood font is rendered by laser printing directly onto 16mm film. Made in Microsoft Paint.
Framestorm
Dir. James Pomeroy
3:30 | Experimental / Animation | Colour | January 2012
Techniques: Pixilation
Language: English
Framestorm is a short abstract film, shot frame by frame using a pixilation of surfaces technique that is an experiment in colour rhythm and movement and an experiment in total improvisation inspired by the Free Jazz compositions of Ornette Coleman.
Allan Gardens
Dir. Leslie Supnet
5:55 | Experimental | B&W | October 2013
Techniques: Special Effects, Visual Effects
Language: English
Light bends to reveal the caged garden. Movement by intuition and memory with seemingly endless time.
Between
Dir. Heidi Phillips
1:19 | Experimental | B&W | 2012
Techniques: Drawing/Painting on cels, DV
Someone once said that the only interesting story is the human face. In Between, Phillips superimposes family portraits with handmade emulsion. The connection between the textures and the face is very energetic.
Black Rectangle
Dir. Rhayne Vermette
2:00 | Experimental | Colour | 2013
Techniques: Found Footage
“Time has not been kind to Kasimir Malevich’s painting, Black Square. In 1915 when the work was first displayed the surface of the square was pristine and pure; now the black paint has cracked revealing the white ground like mortar in crazy paving.”
This film documents a tedious process of dismantling and reassembling 16mm found footage. The film collage imitates functions of a curtain, while the recorded optical track describes the film’s subsequent destruction during its first projection.
DEMI MONDE
Dir. Caroline Monnet
3:29 | Experimental | B&W | October 2013
Techniques: Hand Process (b&w)
A distinct world – that is often an isolated part of a larger world – is viscerally envisioned in this uniquely hand- processed film.
Stamma Loops
Dir. Greg Hanec
4 | Experimental | B&W | July 2025
Techniques: Digitized 16mm film
Stamma Loops was designed using found loops of an orchestra demonstration for kids. The black and white footage is of various instruments showing scales, kids singing and whistling, an Indigenous drummer, and more. The loops are presented on a split screen and since they are different lengths (12 seconds/ 14 seconds/10 seconds/etc), they interact in new ways each time around. This new interaction causes unique and unusual “musical” combinations. As well, the projector sounds and the pops and clicks of the tape edits are included. Stamma Loops is another in Greg Hanec’s ongoing investigation into the nature of looping and loop interaction that began in the late 1990’s.
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Dave Barber Cinematheque, Main Floor - 100 Arthur Street,Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
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