Directing
A research scientist explores the boundaries and frontiers of human consciousness. Using sensory deprivation and hallucinogenic mixtures from Native American shamans, he explores these altered states of cognizance and finds that memory, time, and reality itself are states of mind.
A continuous dissolve of 87 male and female nudes. "The film's fascination lies with the suspense of that magic moment, halfway between two persons, when the dissolve technique produces composite figures, oftentimes hermaphroditic, that inspires awe for the mystery of the human form." - B. Ruby Rich, Chicago Art Institute
Moon 1969 is a beautiful, eerie, haunting film, all the more wonderful for the fact we do not once see the moon: only the manifestation of its powers here on earth, the ebb and flow of the waters.. fiery rainbows into a cloudy sky... men and rockets transformed into shattering crystals... creating a picture if the cosmos in continual transformation."-- Gene Youngblood, Los Angeles Times "The interrelated convolutions and spasms of image, color, and sound that filmmaker Bartlett creates is the cumulative effect of his pioneer work using negative images, polarization, television techniques, computer-film, and electronic patterns all compressed into a visual punch that directs one where he normally would not go with a film -- on a trip in search of the human soul. -- Paul Brawley, The Booklist, American Library Association
Barlett narrates MAKING SERPENT and describes the creative process behind SERPENT, his award winning short of 1971. MAKING SERPENT is a step-by-step teaching device that explores film techniques such as: how to structure a non- verbal narrative; how to shoot film for special editing techniques; how to isolate universal images in nature; how to make exciting visuals inexpensively. Shown together with SERPENT, this film becomes an important educational aid for film and art students alike. An entire film course in cinemagraphics. – Gail Silva, Film Arts Foundation, California I consider it a reasonable antidote to some of the loose pretensions of structural film. – Stan Brakage, Filmmaker Colorado Eisenstein Film Form Continued on Film. – Bruce Baillie, Filmmaker, Washington.
Financed by Guggenheim Fellowship. The serpent embodies the primal chaotic life force in mythic symbology. SERPENT uses natural and electronic imagery to convey this elusive creative force. An outstanding piece of art. Striking, kinetic. Its form, techniques, and texture patterns should be studied by all aspiring young filmmakers. A beautiful combination of pure visual poetry and ideas about man and the world. – Jurors, American Film Festival.
A short, black and white experimental film by San Francisco bay area avant-garde filmmaker Scott Bartlett.
Experimental Filmmaker Scott Bartlett speaks of his filmmaking techniques and aesthetics at the time of OffOn's release. The film includes scenes from an experimental video class in which students incorporate Bartlett's footage from his film OffOn into a new live video mix.
An extraordinary, lucid and lyrical documentary of Morocco, unique in that it conveys both the exterior and interior values of the country. "The richest, boldest and most subtly disciplined evocation of a place that I have ever seen on film. It is as if all the impulse toward lyrical pattern had found an objective correlative in the walls, the steps, the tiles, the dense calligraphic decoration, the shaded windows and veiled eyes of the city." – Roger Greespun, New York Times
Working and playing hard at a northern California commune – fast-paced cutting to Taj Mahal's "Happy to be just like I am."
During the 1970s I shot, helped to make, or commissioned about ten document films, mainly about film-makers. This film is one of them. It was made with Dan Ochiva, who acted as cameraman on about half of the footage. I shot the rest, and then edited the film. It is a record of a conference held at the State University of New York at Buffalo on March 22-25, 1973. Among the participants filmed were Gerald O'Grady (who organized the conference), Will Hindle, Stan Brakhage, Jonas Mekas, Robert Creeley, Bruce Baillie, Scott Bartlett, Hollis Frampton, Ken Jacobs, Ed Pincus, Stan Vanderbeek, Ed Emshwiller, Sally Dixon, James Cox. This footage will eventually become part of my film PEOPLE, PLACES, THE 1970S. –R. H.
A delicate and arousing treatment of lovemaking. Its mode is simple and classical, combining technical mastery and personal restraint. The image is vivid subtle and ambiguous while the sound is sharp and clear. Barlett's film, in the judge's opinion, most closely approximated their idea of what is an erotic film should be – an imaginative, suggestive, artistic, non- clinical evocation of the sexual act. – Bruce Conner, Maurice Girodias, Arthur Knight: judges at the First Ever Erotic Film Festival 1970
The human eye, the human form, the human face: these are the three central images of this avant-garde collage and kaleidoscope of shifting and fractured images, changing colors, and pulsing rhythms. Near the end, a tree appears briefly, and birds fly - first white, then red and blue. Celtic knots morph from one to another. The images become Rorschach tests although the mood, driven by the rapid changing images and the soundtrack, remains frantic.
A graphic disintegration of paranoia, perversion and violence in Chicago. (worldcat.org)
A continuous dissolve into a series of happy nude couples in various configurations: female/male, female/female, male/male, as the Rolling Stones sing 'We Love You'. –F.
Originally shot in color, this politically-charged special was a collaboration between young artists angry at the system. Just days before airing, the Master tapes were 'accidentally' erased. It was taken to court and, after several years, the local TV station was found guilty of willfully destroying the tapes. Featuring inventive VFX and co-opting songs by the Doors, Dylan and the Steve Miller Band. "Seven young men, each of them involved in one of the arts [...] talk for the greater part of the film. They are involved in a discussion of mystical processes important to them" - Film-makers Co-Op
A dramatic autobiographical film that is a multiplexed portrait of the San Francisco sub-culture of the 1960's, "a lasting testament to a time we will never forget"
Financed by the National Endowment of the Arts. Prior to filming the SOUND OF ONE, Bartlett studied dance as a student enrolled at the Inner Research Institute. His teacher was Martin Inn. This student-teacher relationship evolved into a collaboration in which Barlett and Inn scripted a summer workshop course entitled The Application of T'si Chi Ch'uan to the Art of Filmmaking. SOUND OF ONE is the fruit of that program, a melding of the two disciplines. SOUND OF ONE records the short form of the T'ai Chi dance as a solo figure moves through changing landscapes – oceanside to forest to volcano peak – to represent the five elements: water, wood, fire, air and metal.
