The place of memory: Remediation and the personal moving image archive

Moore, Stuart

Abstract

This thesis interrogates the ways in which the formation of an archive of Super 8 film shot by the filmmaker-researcher creates a ‘physical place’ in which to encounter memory and trauma, alongside digitised versions, and investigates the ways in which filmmaking can provide an understanding of how memory and place interact through this intuitive creative practice.

The researcher developed a process-led methodology of ‘remembering’ through repeated engagement with digitised 8mm film material. This remediation explored the materiality of physical film in contrast to the more ephemeral ‘presence’ of both memories and digital material. The thesis presents five Key Practice Works: One Second and Day (2017) and 31 Days (2017), split-screen works that fracture the normal flow of on-screen time. A wholly digital work, Father-land (2018), explores how an ‘archive film’ can be made where no rushes exist; here, a method of ‘returning’ was developed, filming on location then recording unrehearsed narration later at the same place. The production of two films, Finborough Road (2018) and Returning to Dungeness (2022), advanced the enquiry by visiting places filmed decades earlier on Super 8 to record narration in their profilmic spaces. Three Supplemental Practice Works provide additional insights and opportunities for reflective analysis into process and film materiality.

Situated as personal film within the field of artists’ moving image practice, the study is informed by Jaimie Baron’s concept of ‘the archive effect’ and draws on Dylan Trigg’s writing on phenomenology, trauma and place. Conceptual anchors are provided regarding personal filmmaking by Alisa Lebow, Annette Kuhn and Vivian Sobchack, and on the archive and trauma through the scholarship of Cathy Caruth, Janet Walker and Laura Marks, along with Avery Gordon’s notion of haunting and the ghostly. The research is contextualised by an analysis of the memory film practices of three artists’ works: Chris Marker’s Sunless (1983), Derek Jarman’s Glitterbug (1994) and Sarah Turner’s Perestroika (2010), in addition to film works by Jenni Olson, Milene Gierke and Nathaniel Dorsky.

This thesis provides a significant extension to insights into Jamie Baron’s ‘archive effect’ through the detailed analysis of the author’s personal Super 8 films, which are simultaneously an archive and a collection of rushes. An innovative method of narration, ‘speaking in place’, was evolved through the enquiry. The research contributes new knowledge to the debate and discussion surrounding essay film production and scholarship, particularly the dynamic interaction over time between filmic spaces and their filming locations. In so doing, the thesis demonstrates how the specificities of materiality and presentation manifest a place of memory.

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Jun 1, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: Mar 26, 2024
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/9596879
• Award Date: Mar 26, 2024