In a time and place where the gracious mother Sophia, Goddess of Wisdom, weaves her tapestry from illustrations of William Blake and Arthur Rackham with assorted ephemera of men, animals and the flora of the world; where balloons sail to the moon goddess and the ancient world protrudes; where the...

ANCESTORS relates spiritual forefathers and foremothers in a purely fanciful sense. These are classical figures, anatomical figures, fairy tale figures and romantic figures all thrown in together, all from Lawrence Jordan's creative root-sources, in a kind of playful tribute. Like the second part...

Poet Joanna McClure requested a film with the collages of Max Ernst and Lawrence Jordan decided to make a tribute to the two men who most influenced his film-work at the beginning: Max Ernst (collage) and Luis Buñuel (surrealism in cinema). A few years earlier, from late-2011 until October 2013, ...

Writer / director Lawrence Jordan's intention was to follow the idea of James Agee to present "an imaginary story against a background of reality." The imaginary story in this instance is of Paul Rose and his past incarnation in classical Greek times. Jordan collaborated with George Kuchar (who c...

In a timeless world of surreal possibilities, the conjunctions and strange meetings of humans, animals and improbable objects coalesce, linger and move on to the truly timeless and ethereal music of John Davis.

There are no hidden meanings in these conjunctions except those that form in the mind...

Where all is static motion, where music and light become one, where change and motion become one and where the end is the beginning. Black-and-white cut-out animation with touches of color. Ladies of the past encounter science and natural phenomena.

An "in-camera" document or journalistic writing on film with no subsequent deletions or re-ordering. The first partly-pixilated "diary film" of which the filmmaker is aware.

As with RODIA-ESTUDIANTINA, only one shot (which probably was the result of lapse in concentration), deleted from the orig...

THE BLACK OUD represents a subtle new direction in documentary. Lawrence Jordan used the term "bio-documentary" to describe the slight, though essential, differences between this film and the majority of personal or experimental documentaries made in the decade prior. Of course, the prefix "bio" ...

Combining the mambo and Tibetan sound-effects with cut-out animation and assorted clips of silent film stars, starring (in order of appearance) Eric von Stroheim, John Gilbert, Greta Garbo, Norma Shearer, Conrad Nagel, Lon Chaney, Alice Terry, Joan Crawford, Lilian Gish, Renée Adorée, May Murray,...

Animation of a new order within the series of short works of that period. Mostly on black space, the figures in blue perform a very compact and jewel-like opera in surreal form, once again to the piano music of Erik Satie. Ideally, the film should be projected on a 30"-wide white card sitting on ...

The scene is set in front of a French chateau. The camera chases improbable incidents across the screen. Many are constructed out of one of Lawrence Jordan's favorite engravings-illustrators: Louis Poyet. Duels occur on a tight rope. Heavier-then-air machines fly by (and sometimes crash). Below, ...

On ancient star maps of magnificent color quality, Lawrence Jordan takes the viewer out of this world into the realm of cosmic imagination. COSMIC ALCHEMY is thematically and visually consistent with his earlier shorts and yet, set to an evocative score by John Davis, Jordan has crossed into an u...

There is a hint of an underwater circus since many of the performers are acrobats. The sea water—if that is what it is—is yellowish brown. A full-faced sun rises from the Sun King's cradle while a moon of Saturn circles the planet. The cut-out animation moves airily through a time-distorted world...

A dance of eclectic objects. A play of demented dolls, wheels and geriatric clocks. Cut-out and stop-motion animation at its formative stage, Jordan-wise.

A "found-footage" film with the original materials too shrunk to print on 16mm. The film was one of four made for the GRAVITY SPELLS project, an album of film and new music by John Davis. The title derives from text in the footage—"These Driving Demons Start Young"—and proceeds to show soap box d...

An established classic. Steel engravings form a surrealistic dream-world. It can be shown to any adventurous audience, young or old, and has never disappointed. The theme (resurrection, rebirth, flight into higher spheres) was thought to be outmoded in the art of this century. Evidently not, judg...

Lawrence Jordan used forty-six Gustave Doré engravings from IDYLLS OF THE KING as settings for this extravagantly romantic saga. As Enid, the protagonist, is seen in a vast array of scenes from deep forests to castle keeps, her champion is sometimes with her, sometimes away fighting archetypal fo...

A series of vaudeville acts inserted between the lines of reality, meant to demonstrate the ephemerality of all things.

The walls come tumbling down. The wheels come off the wagon: thunder, lightning, explosive meditations. Everything seems to be happening all at once. Then, before you can catch your breath, it is over.

An exquisite animation which lifts off and proceeds with the delicacy of a soap bubble. Conceived as a tiny interlude between longer films: a chance to catch one’s breath after and before more aggressive works; a "time out" period for the mind to float effortlessly and free of gravity.

A series of surreal titles are rapidly alternated with cut-out animation. The titles are often simple and the words and images combine easily into an eerie flickering superimposition. Lawrence Jordan was interested in pressing this technique to the limit of informational overload. Sometimes the e...

In the THE FORTY-AND-ONE NIGHTS, painter and collage artist Jess (Collins) performs his "Didactic Nickelodeon" of forty-one (now lost) collages to (his) selected sound bits in the manner of a turn-of-the-century cinematic jukebox.

The second—albeit completed first—of the H.D. TRILOGY (consisting of THE BLACK OUD, this film and STAR OF DAY). Adapted from THE GROVE OF ACADEME, the second part of HERMETIC DEFINITION.

Animation. The theme is weightlessness. Objects and characters are cut loose from habitual meanings as well as tensions and gravitational limitations. A lyric Erik Satie track accompanies the film. Such a portrait seems necessary from time to time to remind us that equilibrium and harmony are pos...