CVM Collections: Access and Distribution of Films and Videos

CVM provides access to Visual Music, abstract cinema and experimental animation through a variety of activities. This page provides information on:

• Curated Film Programs: Oskar Fischinger, Mary Ellen Bute, Baerbel Neubauer, Legendary Light Shows, and NEW Essential Visual Music Program
• Online Store (research copies on video and DVD)
• Selected print rentals and archival loans
• On-site Research
• Licensing for Museum Exhibition

For Other Information on Special Collections (Paper, Monograph and other materials), please visit our Collections and Archives page. For research material, you may wish to start with our Online Library.

• Featuring 35mm prints of Fischinger's classic visual music films, including Allegretto, Study No. 6, Study No. 7, Radio Dynamics, Composition in Blue, Motion Painting No. 1, Kreise, American March, Spirals, Coloratura, Spiritual Constructions, Walking from Munich to Berlin, and others. Most are preserved or new prints. Provided in association with the Fischinger Archive. Includes prints preserved by Academy Film Archive, Center for Visual Music and Fischinger Archive, with the support of Film Foundation, Sony, Cinémathèque québécoise and Deutsches Filmmuseum.
• Program is approx. 70 minutes, 35mm

Rental is subject to conditions including the screening of the complete show, with no re-ordering or re-assembling. Qualified institutions must certify that they do not use a platter projection system and are capable of archival projection standards. See bottom of page for notes on qualified institutions.* The prints are generally not rented separately. This program cannot be provided on video or DVD.

Essential Visual Music: Rare Classics - NEW Program, May 2008

From German pioneers to Light Show psychedelia to Experimental Animation classics, rare and preseved prints from the Center for Visual Music Archive. Includes films by Oskar and Hans Fischinger, Charles Dockum, Jules Engel, Mary Ellen Bute, light show films and more. 16mm. Please read the full program description

Jordan Belson Program - more information soon

Mary Ellen Bute Program (16mm)

Includes all of Bute's Abstract Films. Known for her pioneering early abstract films (some of which were screened regularly at Radio City Music Hall, New York in the 1930s), and one of the first artists to use oscilloscopes, she is also known for her collaborations with Norman McLaren and Leon Theremin, among others. Program features all of her short abstract films. 16mm prints. Rhythm in Light, 1934; Synchromy No. 2, 1935; Dada, 1936; Parabola, 1937; Escape, 1937; Spook Sport (with animation by Norman McLaren), 1939; Tarantella, 1940; Polka Graph, 1947; Color Rhapsody, 1948; Imagination, 1948; New Sensations in Sound, 1949 (RCA Commercial); Pastorale, 1950; Abstronic, 1952 and Mood Contrasts. Organized by CVM, in association with Cecile Starr and Women's Independent Film Exchange. 16mm. Recently screened in Los Angeles and Chicago.

Legendary Light Shows (16mm and video)

Flashback to the 1960's with a program of rarely seen film and video by legendary light show artists from San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles: Glenn McKay, Tony Martin, Elias Romero, Joshua White, Single Wing Turquoise Bird, Jud Yalkut and others, plus the light show finale excerpt from David Lebrun's Hog Farm Movie. Featuring light, color and liquid projections layered with film and handmade slides, originally performed live at rock concerts. Selections from this program were featured in the 2005 US exhibition "Visual Music" at the Hirshhorn Museum and MOCA LA. This program screened at the Rotterdam International Film Festival, 2006, and in San Francisco at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Program approx. one hour. 16mm and video.

Legendary Light Show images - Top, courtesy Elias Romero, Joshua White, Tony Martin. Bottom, from Single Wing Turquoise Bird, courtesy Peter Mays

Baerbel Neubauer Program

Time and Tides - Music Paintings by Baerbel Neubauer (35mm and DVD, 75 min. program)

• Featuring 35mm prints of Neubauer's direct on film animations (approx 26 minutes):
• 

  Algorithmen (1994, 3:17)
  Falter-Spot 7 (1994, 0:30)
  Roots (1996, 3:40)
  Mondlicht (Moonlight) (1997, 4:11)
  Holiday (1998, 4:30)
  Feuerhaus (Firehouse) (1998, 5:20)
  Passage (2002, 8:02)

• Plus an excerpt from her new work-in-progress Morphs of Pegasus, a computer 3D "motion painting in image and sound," (20 min) and
• Flockenspiel I-IV (2004, DVD): ...an associative journey from 2D to 3D through abstract digital images and music. The images were digitally handpainted with brushes of colours, forms and effects. (BN). The Soundtrack for Flockenspiel III was also painted digitally. 25 minutes, screened on DVD. Gallery of Flockenspiel images
• New work will be added in mid-2008

NOTE: The 35mm prints may be rented as a separate program, without Flockenspiel. As of February 2008, Algorithmen is only available digitally, not currently on 35mm.

Other Programs

Also see our previous programs including:

Visual Music 1 (screened at MOCA)

Visual Music 2 (screened at Filmforum)

Color Organ lecture and screening (recently presented at British Film Institute, London)

Booking inquiries: Email Center for Visual Music

Please provide details including whether your organization is a nonprofit or for-profit organization; date(s) and number of screenings requested; size of screening room (seats). Please note, we do not rent to individuals, only to qualified organizations.* We cannot provide these curated programs for exhibition on DVD (except Neubauer's new film Flockenspiel).

For other recent Visual Music programs curated and presented by CVM, please see our Screenings page

2. Online Store

CVM's online Store offers Research Copies of films on video and DVD. These are for private home use or classroom use only, and most may not be exhibited publicly for a paying audience, or used in museum exhibitions or public screenings without additional permissions, fees and/or licenses. Please inquire if you wish to obtain permission for additional uses. These DVDs, videos and books are also available for purchase via telephone, or at our downtown Los Angeles offices.

3. Print loans and rentals

Under certain conditions, CVM provides access to selected prints from our preservation projects through rentals to qualified institutions. Some of these include:

• 16mm titles by Jules Engel (Accident, Three Arctic Flowers, Celebration, Mobiles, Play Pen, Times Square, others)
• Charles Dockum films (1952 Mobilcolor Performance at the Guggenheim, and 1966 Mobilcolor Documentary and Performance films)
• John Stehura's Cibernetik 5.3 (currently available only on videotape or DVD)

4. On-Site Research

Viewing copies (on video or dvd) of many films are available for onsite study by researchers and scholars at CVM's offices in downtown Los Angeles in the Gallery Row Arts District. Please email or call for an appointment. CVM does not make or provide dubs of these research copies; please see our online Store for available titles.

5. Licensing for Museum Exhibition and Installation

Certain films may be licensed under very specific conditions, subject to copyright holder and/or artist approval. Please provide complete details of your exhibition including description of the gallery space planned for exhibiting films or digital media (what else will be in this space? are there black or white walls? lighting levels? etc.); type of projection and screen, type of projector, or type of monitor; plans for avoiding light and sound leaks; list of other planned films in the exhibition; full list of venues and dates, licensing fee budgeted. We cannot process requests without all of the above information. Email to cvmaccess (at) gmail.com

Please note that many requests are declined by the copyright holders due to insufficient information, unacceptable spaces, or lack of preparation time.

More about CVM's Collections and Archives

Please direct all inquiries to

Center for Visual Music

Via email: CVM
Via phone (downtown Los Angeles office) 213-683-1514