Dreams are an important resource for my work, drawing from them on both aesthetic and narrative levels. I have lifted stories straight from my own dreams, as well as tried to carry over the look and feeling. Mystery, metaphor, and eroticism are significant areas of exploration, and for a long time, I've been drawn to examining the tension between modern industrial culture and the human condition - the ultimate search for meaning in the desolation of the technological age (see MACHINE SONG). But humor frequently plays an important role as well, sometimes with a whimsical spirit akin to Dada (see METAL DOGS OF INDIA).
Between the early 1980s and the early 1990s, my passion was for non-narrative, music-driven filmmaking. I created a series of films which have much the structure of music, particularly their use of repetition and rhythm. I think of these earlier works as "song films." All of the soundtracks in these films are short pieces of music and sound collage, of my own creation, intended to exist as equal partners with the imagery.
This pursuit of "song films" culminated in my 1991 film, CHOREOGRAPHY FOR COPY MACHINE (PHOTOCOPY CHA CHA). This film exemplifies the interaction music and image I had striven to achieve. Also in this film, I was able to explore an original animation technique, generating images solely by using the photographic capabilities of a photocopy machine. The Berlin International Film Festival described the film as "a swinging essay about physiognomy in the age of photo-mechanical reproduction."
Since the early 1990s, my interest has drifted towards narrative filmmaking. My 1997 film, LOVE AND OTHER DIFFICULTIES, is a hybrid of narrative fiction, personal documentary, and experimental animation.
My most recent film, DIRT, is only available on video. It can be purchased by itself or in a short film collection (see description below).
Chel White's website: www.chelwhite.com
Film and music by Chel White. Optical printing assistant: Sharon Sandusky; Production Assistant: Susan Navarre Chaney; Music Assistants: Dan Gediman and Sandy Hollis.
An examination of the purely sensual aspects of film, using color, light and motion to create a subtle visual experience, while drawing on possible metaphors between the subconscious and its universal symbol, the sea.
"Creates a poetic aura around the solitary figure of a swimming woman." - P.G. Springer, Variety
Award: NY Filmmakers' Exposition, 1986
Exhibition: Ann Arbor Film Festival, 1985; SF Art Institute Film Festival, 1985; Experimental Film Festival, Chicago, 1985.
1984, 16mm, color/so, 4.5m, $20
Film and music by Chel White.
An absurdist collage of quirky and colorful childlike drawings, animated directly onto the celluloid surface of the film in hundreds of tiny drawings. There are a few recurring themes, in the spirit of Dada, from industrial culture to the absurd. "Lively, bouncy, and unpretentious." - Athens International Film Festival
Awards: CINE Golden Eagle, 1985; Golden Athena, Athens Int'l Film Festival, 1985; Silver Plaque, Chicago Int'l Film Festival, 1985; Sinking Creek Film & Video Festival, 1985; Humboldt Film Festival, 1985; Marin Film Festival, 1985; Ann Arbor Film Festival, 1985; SF Art Institute Film Festival, 1986; NY Filmmakers' Exposition, 1986.
1985, 16mm, color/so, 3.5m, $25
Assistant Photographer: Susan Chaney
Presented in a stylized collage of photo-xerox animation, MACHINE SONG addresses the post-industrial human condition. Its images and sounds relate to both a fear and a fascination with mechanization, in a culture which has grown increasingly dependent on machines and technology.
"A judicious use of minimal images, repeated with assembly-line precision, evoking the grinding pressures of our increasingly mechanized lives." - Karen Cooper, New York Film Forum
Awards and Exhibition: Ann Arbor; Aspen; Athens Int'l; Big Muddy; Infermental, Japan; NY Filmmakers' Exposition; Northwest; Sinking Creek Film & Video Festival.
1987, 16mm, b&w&red/so, 3.5m, $25
A bizarre mixture of the surreal, the sensual, the beautiful, and the absurd, all tied together in a fast-paced collage of humor and photocopy fetish.
All of the film's images were created solely by using the photographic capabilities of a photocopying machine to generate sequential pictures of hands, faces, and other body parts.
"Chel White's marvelous meditation on the joys of Xerox and Duke Ellington." - 1991 Seattle International Film Festival
"Takes a game we've all played with our hands, faces, and other body parts and raises it to the sublime." John Lewis, Dallas Observer
Awards and Exhibition: First Place, Animation, USA Film Festival, Dallas; First Place, Animation, Ann Arbor Film Festival; First Place, Animation, Marin Film and Video Expo; Silver Award, Houston Int'l Film Festival; Best Experimental Animation, Humboldt Film Festival.
1991, 16mm, color/so, 3.5m, $25
Written and directed by Chel White. Photography: Chel White and Susan Navarre Chaney; Editor: George Mitchell; Sound Design: Lance Limbocker and Drew Canulette; Script Consultant: Christine M. Toth.
"A beautifully shot meditation on the obsessive nature of romantic love that uses Patsy Cline's 'I Fall to Pieces' to good effect." - 1998 Johns Hopkins Film and Video Festival
Memories, loss, longing and addiction are all important elements, as the film unravels with a poetic and dream-like sensibility. LOVE AND OTHER DIFFICULTIES examines the classic associations made between music and memories, and the puzzling human desire to hold onto something, anything, when the memories are all that remain.
Funded in part by grants from the Western States Regional Media Arts Fellowship and the Oregon Arts Commission. Award: Director's Award, Black Maria Film and Video Festival
Exhibition: Ann Arbor, Atlanta, Big Muddy, Humboldt and Johns Hopkins film festivals; Retina Experimental Film Festival, Hungary.
1997, 16mm, color/so, 8m, $30
Directed & produced by Chel White. Written by Joe Frank. Director of Photography Mark Eifert, Edited by Cam Williams. Art Director Malia Jensen. Sound Design by Lance Limbocker. Noise by Daniel Menche. Cast: Vana O'Brien, Randy Russell, Gina Velour, and Teresa Dulce.
Eerie, erotic, and touching, Soulmate is a complex study of alienation and sexual obsession. Told from the point-of-view of a 55-year old woman, it explores longing and objectification through the story of a landlady and her much younger male tenant. Based on a radio play by Joe Frank.
"A bold and unsettling film_with chilling acuity, confronts sexual loneliness, or rather, allows it to confront us." -Todd Haynes
"A wonderful and surprisingly touching film, with rich and subtle content that slowly reveals it's true self." -Howard Aaron, curator
Funded in part by a grant from the Oregon Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts awarded by the Northwest Film Center, and by a grant from the Regional Arts and Culture Council (Portland).
Awards: Best Narrative Film & Best Actress, 2001 Big Muddy Film Festival; Best Narrative Film, 2001 Humboldt Film Festival; Best Narrative Film & Audience Award, 2000 Northwest Film & Video Festival; Best Experimental Film, 2001 Convergence Festival; "Red Hot & Spicy" Award, 2001 Ann Arbor Film Festival; Director's Award, 2001 Black Maria Film Festival.
Exhibition: Hamburg Filmfest, London Int'l Film Festival, Nantucket Film Festival, Florida Film Festival, Nashville Film Festival, and the Philadelphia Festival of World Cinema.
2000, 16mm, color/so, 14m, $40
This is a collection of Chel White's short films from the past 20 years. Consistently defying categorization, his work explores love, obsession, alienation, memories and dreams. His narrative films are often told from the perspective of the estranged individual, the outsider looking in. He uses allegory and occasionally black humor to paint indelible pictures of the human experience. Described as a cinematic poet, his work is intricate, sublime, and beautiful. This disk includes three film adaptations of stories by radio artist Joe Frank.
"(Chel White's) work seems to dispatch itself from some secret, subversive code, flashing messages amid animation, obscure stock footage, and actors with crazy eyes." —Austin Chronicle
This DVD includes: Choreography for Copy Machine [Photocopy Cha Cha] (1991), Dirt (1998), Soulmate (2000), Passage (2001), Eclipse (2003), Magda (2004), Dream #631 (2004), and A Painful Glimpse Into My Writing Process [In Less Than 60 Seconds] (2005). It also features 2 early animated films, Metal Dogs of India (1985) and Machine Song (1987), behind the scenes material, out-takes, experiments, film book, and more. The films on this DVD have been shown in film festivals all over the world, and recognized with many awards, including Best Short Film from the Stockholm Film Festival, and the EMPA Work Life Award from the Ann Arbor Film Festival. Chel White's work has screened at the Smithsonian Museum and two commissioned projects he directed are in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art (NY). Festivals: Ann Arbor, Berlin, Big Muddy, Black Maria, Chicago Int'l, Chicago Underground, Clermont-Ferrand, Cork, Florida, Hamburg, Hiroshima, Humboldt, Images Festival, L'Alternativa, Melbourne, Nantucket, Nashville, London Int'l, Oberhausen, Portland Int'l, Rotterdam, Seattle Int'l, South by Southwest, Sundance, Zagreb, and many more.
1985-2005, DVD, color/so, 60m, $24 Home; $40 Other