Research: Errata
Common errors, and errata in recent publications and websites regarding Visual Music.
Plus a few curiosities and notes.
At CVM, we see many of the same errors repeated and spread over and over again in papers, articles, dissertations and books. Other errors below are new, some rather bizarre fiction. We hope that this resource will encourage and assist more accurate scholarship in the field of Visual Music. Researchers should beware, a number of early Moritz articles placed online at various sites also contain incorrect information, not only about Fischinger but Belson, Hirsh and other artists. See CVM's online Library for annotated versions with corrected/updated information; a few notes are also below.
Section A: Recent Publications
Section B: Websites
Section C: Common errata
Section D: Misc. Articles and Older Publications
Section A: Recent Publications
Moritz, William. Optical Poetry:The Life and Work of Oskar Fischinger. John Libbey Publishing, 2004; in the US and Canada, Indiana University Press
This wonderful biography unfortunately contains some errors, and some "elaborations." Some material has been found to be incorrect, through later research or information from his children and German relatives. A few items are below, we'll add more as time allows.
Kreise (1933). Re Moritz's claim that it was the first color film in Europe. Though it was certainly one of the first, no evidence has been ever found to support the claim of "the first."
Page 12. "...in a letter Oskar says Erich Korngold was composing a musical score for Fieber I, II, III (Fever)." This letter has not been found in Fischinger's papers, nor any correspondence with Korngold about such a project. However a letter was found from Fischinger offering his multiple projector show to the Director of a theatre, and Fischinger writes that this performance will have a score by Korngold. No reviews or reports have been found that he did use anything by Korngold.
Page 58-61. Re Komposition in Blau and the Venice Film Festival. Despite statements about Fischinger working on this film secretly, and that "no German distributor dared to pick up" the film, it was actually registered. The film received a censor permit on May 10, 1935, thus making it legal to screen.
Still from 1952 Dockum Mobilcolor Performance Film
Page 110. Re Dockum Mobilcolor. At the 1952 performance by Charles Dockum at the Guggenheim (New York), some footage was shot by Ted Nemeth, who was Mary Ellen Bute's cameraman and husband. We have not found any evidence that Mary Ellen Bute assisted or shot this, or was even there, and this statement that Bute shot the footage is likely incorrect. Dockum worked on other occasions with Ted Nemeth as a hired cameraman. It is however possible that Mary Ellen Bute witnessed the performance or accompanied Ted Nemeth. That 1952 performance footage has been preserved by Center for Visual Music.
Page 138. Re the painting here called "Outward Movement." Oskar's original name for this painting was "Manhattan," according to The Fischinger Trust. No one is certain who attached the name Outward Movement. Oskar did not name many other of his paintings, some names were assigned after his death by Elfriede Fischinger and/or Martina Dillmann.
Page 147. Re the Lumigraph. The Lumigraph did not appear on the Andy Williams TV show as stated. Representatives from the show visited Fischinger's studio but decided the Lumigraph was not bright enough to be filmed. (Source: Barbara Fischinger, Oskar's daughter).
Page 164. Testimonial from Alexeieff and Parker: Film historian Cecile Starr has relayed that Alexeiff's daughter disputed this account (to Starr directly), claining this was not how they met.
Pahe 235. NOTE re discussion of Motion Painting No. 1 preservation, specifically 16mm reduction prints. Moritz here admits a "more modern soundtrack" taken from "more recent" recordings was used for these 16mm prints - unfornately what this means is he used different recordings at different tempos for 16mm prints of this film. A caveat to those studying Fischinger's synchronization...
UPDATE to information on page 238, Sources: Jack Rutberg Fine Arts is no longer the dealer for The Fischinger Trust paintings. Their new exclusive painting dealer is the Peyton-Wright Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico. To book the 35mm Fischinger Retrospective, or for licensing or sales, please contact CVM at cvmaccess (at) gmail (dot) com
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Exchange and Evolution: Worldwide Video Long Beach 1974-1980. Huffman, Kathy Rae, ed. Long Beach Museum of Art, 2011, ex cat. Contains errors re Oskar Fischinger. Fischinger was not "indentured" to Paramount for many years, as stated. He resigned and left the studio within his first year of work (resignation letter online). Allegretto was not "an early color film produced at Paramount" as stated in the essay by Huffman, p. 105. Fischinger resigned because Paramount would not allow him to print in color the film he'd been hired to make there (which was then called Radio Dynamics). The year for Allegretto stated here on several pages (105, 154) is also incorrect for this film. Allegretto was completed in color seven years later, in 1943. The name of the studio he worked for in 1936 was Paramount Productions, Inc. and Paramount Pictures, not Paramount Films as stated here.
His early series of Studies were not originally "aimed at advertising" as stated here; they began as his personal experiments. Read more about Fischinger's series of Studies in the Film Notes section of these pages, and in Moritz's Optical Poetry biography of Fischinger.
It's not entirely accurate to state that Fischinger is well known for his "animation sequences in Fantasia," as discussed in this catalogue. He did not actually complete any sequences for this film, he resigned when his designs were substantially altered. While his influence can be seen in the film, his actual work cannot.
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Radical Light: Alternative Film & Video in the San Francisco Bay Area, 1945-2000. Anker, Geritz and Seid, Eds. Page 110: Jordan Belson confirms he did not use oscilloscopes for the effects in his film Allures (1961). He did use interference pattern projectors. Later in the book, the date for the film Cycles is incorrect, it should be 1974, confirmed by Steve Beck, the co-creator of this film.
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Lund, Cornelia and Holger, Eds. Audio.Visual - On Visual Music and Related Media. 2009.
Page 153. "What are the visual analogies of melody, harmony, rhythm, and counterpoint?" This statement is not attributed to its original author, William Moritz, who wrote "What are the visual equivalents of melody, harmony, rhythm and counterpoint?" in his 1986 essay, Towards an Aesthetics of Visual Music
Page 258-9. "...Other experimental film directors - Oskar Fischinger, Hans Richter, and Viking Eggeling, for example, pursued similar forms of collaboration with composers in the early 1920s, but most of the resulting original music has been lost over time." Oskar Fischinger's papers contain no references or information about such collaborations. Original music was not composed for Fischinger films until much later, well beyond the 1920s. This statement may be a reference to Alexander Laszlo's mid-1920s performances, and his brief collaboration using a reel of Fischinger's abstract films; but he did not compose music for Fischinger's film(s), and his music is well documented. In the mid to late 1920s Fischinger performed multiple projector shows to various live percussive accompaniment; this seems to have been accompaniment, there is no record of his commissioning any specific score. (See Korngold reference above, in Optical Poetry section). In the mid-1930s we do find letters exploring such a concept, which was not realized.
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Young, Paul and Paul Duncan, Editor. Art Cinema. Taschen, 2009.
Page 52. Fischinger’s series of Studies between 1929 and 1932 were not “often shown in large concert halls with live musical
accompaniment” as claimed here. That would have been an exceptional occasion, and no records of this have been found anywhere in Fischinger's papers or clippings; the Studies however were actually often screened in first run movie theatres before a feature film. (See Moritz, Optical Poetry or Film Culture).
Page 32. Thomas Wilfred did not make cinema.
Page 66. Re the Jordan Belson text on this page; Belson has confirmed its inaccuracy; he did not design “an optical bench similar to the Whitney’s,” nor is the description correct of its operation “in real time thanks to small motors and pulleys.” Also on this page, the caption for the Epilogue image lacks a credit to The New York Times (Michael Kimmelman, July 1, 2005) for the original phrase, reprinted here uncredited, describing Epilogue’s “lush, misty optics.”
Page 119, description of Vortex Concerts. Belson confirms he did not use overhead projectors and film loops at Vortex as stated here. He is not a “pioneer” of overhead projectors. The Vortex Concerts didn’t continue into the early 1960s; they ended in 1959 (for sources, see Vortex below in Section C: Common Errata).
Page 190, Belson was not the producer or editor of his film Epilogue (2005); he is the director. The producer was Cindy Keefer and the editor was David Lebrun (see on screen tail credits for Epilogue, on the Jordan Belson DVD).---------------------------------------
Frank, Peter. MidCentury Modernists in LA Weekly, 8/22/07. "Several pioneering L.A. abstractionists were active in the animation studios; Jules Engel, in fact, replaced Oskar Fischinger at Disney." This is incorrect; the two artists met each other while working on Fantasia, during the same time period. They became lifelong friends. (Sources: William Moritz, Barbara Fischinger, Jules Engel).
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Brougher, Kerry et al. Visual Music: Synaesthesia in Art and Music Since 1900 (2005).
(c) Fischinger Trust
Page 125. Re Fischinger's optical / ornament sound experiments - he didn't photograph scrolls, the scrolls were used for faked publicity photographs so that his competitors couldn't learn his techniques. (Sources: William Moritz, Elfriede Fischinger in various articles; and Moritz's Optical Poetry).
Page 133. The Whitney triple screen film is described here as John Whitney Jr.'s "1965 triple-screen film Side Phase Drift." But Gene Youngblood, in his 1970 Expanded Cinema, wrote of Whitney's "now famous, triple-screen film that remains untitled" and notes it premiered in 1967. Stills from the film in the Expanded Cinema book also carry the caption "John Whitney, Jr. Untitled, 1967." We do not believe this to be an error by Brougher.
Page 166. The lineup of the light show group Single Wing Turquoise Bird listed here neglects to include original member Michael Scroggins.
Rees, A. L. A History of Experimental Film and Video. London: British Film Institute, 2008.
Page 58. Rees writes about Fischinger, "...like his fellow-exile Len Lye, his work became more purely absolute as his commercial career foundered (Fischinger's watershed crisis was seemingly Disney's rejection of his abstract designs for Fantasia)." In fact, Fischinger had been making absolute films since approximately 1920, well before he made any commercials, and nearly two decades before the Disney incident.
Section B: Websites (too many to list, only a few follow)
Los Angeles Filmforum, Alternative Projections website. Contains numerous errors regarding Oskar Fischinger, Jordan Belson, William Moritz, Hy Hirsh, Richard Baily and their individual films. Extensive use of inaccurate information taken from other websites, and inaccuracies gleaned from decades-old information. More details forthcoming. A project funded by Pacific Standard Time.
Tobey C. Moss Gallery: Oskar Fischinger Chronology. Contains numerous errors. Oskar did not renounce easel painting in 1921 (there is no statement by Fischinger to this effect or any evidence in his papers; this is however often attributed to Walter Ruttmann), and he did not make abstract films called Chronography. He did not make his Studies synchronized to music in Munich (they were made in Berlin); he did not die painting at his easel, but in the hospital.
Michael Betancourt, Cinegraphic blog. Contains various errors, particularly regarding Fischinger. Some appear to have been corrected after this page first posted notes.
a. Re Oskar Fischinger in the Mary Ellen Bute piece (3/13/2011) - errors appear to have been corrected after notes were posted on this page.
b. Re "Oskar Fischinger's Synchronized Abstractions" - The "various physical processes" used by Fischinger in his early films were not later used by Jordan Belson, as claimed here; their techniques differ greatly. While one basic technique may have been used by Belson and many others, stating that various of Fischinger's techniques were adopted by Belson is not correct.
Hans Fischinger did not direct or make Oskar's Studies nr 9, 10 or 11 as stated in this article and its various versions. While his influence and work as an animator is visible, these are Oskar's films which contain Hans' work as directed by Oskar (see Moritz, Optical Poetry). Regarding Studie nr 12, it is uncertain, though the film carries Oskar's credit as director, and the credit "drawn by Hans Fischinger." See Moritz, Optical Poetry, pps 214-218. Regarding the statement that Oskar produced, after Kreise (1935) "several more abstract films as 'advertisements' " in Germany - his series of cigarette commercials are technically not abstract, in the manner of his other films. While his film Komposition in Blau was later used by others, after Fischinger left Germany, as an advertisement by adding an end product shot, Fischinger did not produce it as an ad (see Gunnar Strom, Fumes from the Fjords, AWN 1997; note though that Tolirag was not originally a collaborator on Komposition in Blau). Regarding statements on this site re studio contracts, Oskar did indeed have a contract with both Disney and MGM. (Source: Moritz, Optical Poetry and contracts in Fischinger Collection and Archive)
Regarding the statement here that Oskar was fired from Paramount, this is incorrect. Oskar resigned from Paramount over the issue of color printing, his 1936 resignation letter can be read here. Re synchronization, another statement by Fischinger about his synchronization can be read at the end of this page.
The name of Moritz's Fischinger biography is cited here with an incorrect spelling. It should be Optical Poetry: The Life and Work of Oskar Fischinger. Betancourt has spelled Oskar's name with a c, which is not the spelling used by Moritz.
c. In "Visual Music and the Paik-Abe Synthesizer" (July 24): Oskar Fischinger does not have "fragmentary work in Walt Disney’s Fantasia" as stated here. While some of his influence can be seen, his actual work cannot.
d. "Walther Ruttmann's Lichtspiel Films" (February 27): "This collection of films by Walther Ruttmann, Hans Richter and Viking Eggeling are the oldest fully abstract motion pictures still to survive." This statement ignores the early films and experiments of Oskar Fischinger, beginning in 1919, which still survive.
Richter's first abstract film was not exhibited in 1923, as stated here; see Richter section below, in Section D, and the work of Jeanpaul Goergen and others (more sources to come).
"Fischinger would also begin making films during the 1920s, but did not produce fully abstract films until after optical sound was adopted as the standard in 1927." This is incorrect, as his early films such as Staffs and Spirals are fully abstract (besides the Wax experiments films).
Re Fischinger's wax slicing machine "... that Ruttmann bought, but apparently never used." Ruttman used the machine to prepare imagery used in Lotte Reiniger's famous film Prinz Achmed (Source: Moritz, Optical Poetry, p. 9).
e. "CVM's Research" (Aug. 19). Despite his criticism of CVM's information and complaints re sources, in an email to Barbara Fischinger on July 13, 2011, Betancourt writes: "I am very excited to see you have posted an errata page. This is a great step towards improving the scholarship generally...(These comments were very useful.)...I wanted to say thank you for taking the time to post this large compendium of materials. I know it will be useful to scholars (myself included)." and "I'm glad you've done this service."
IMDB - errors too numerous to list. Not a reliable source for many visual music filmmakers. Wikipedia also contains numerous errors.
Youtube - Extensive errata. We don't even know where to start, there are too many.
--Hy Hirsh films on youtube. The long-standing "official distributors" are not acknowledged here as distributors- LUX London and Light Cone, Paris. The new head credit placed here on Come Closer, "copyright 1952 Creative Film Society" is not accurate; Hirsh was still alive in 1952 and had not given his copyrights away to anyone, including a company not even formed until a decade and a half later. Same error for Scratch Pad (1960) and Chasses des Touches (1959); Hirsh was still alive and held his own copyrights.
--See below re Harry Smith film on youtube, Homage to Oskar Fischinger, often credited to Fischinger.
Section C: Common errata Some of the most common errors related to visual music we see continually repeated in papers, articles, and books:
Neither John Whitney nor Jordan Belson worked on or contributed film to the Hollywood feature film 2001: A Space Odyssey. The slit-scan technique used in this film was copied from Whitney's work and techniques. Whitney's slit-scan effect can be seen in the long version of his film Catalog. source forthcoming
James Whitney did not use computers to make his film Yantra. It was hand-made; read about it here. About Lapis and John Whitney's early computer animation, William Moritz discusses here.
There were not 100 Vortex Concerts, or 62 or 60, as often printed, according to Jordan Belson, who states there were far fewer. From Keefer, Cindy: "Cosmic Cinema and The Vortex Concerts." Cosmos: The Search for the Origins, from Kupka to Kubrick. Arnauld Pierre, Ed. Madrid:El Umbral/Santa Cruz de Tenerife:TEA, 2008): Page 361 and 475, Footnote 1: "In May 2008, Belson remembers there were only a few dozen Concerts. No documentation has been found to support the statements of “over 100 concerts” which appear in many texts. From existing documentation today it is possible to verify around 35 concerts, including Brussels...Many texts refer to “over 100” concerts though in 1967 Sheldon Renan writes of 62...However, Belson does not support the accounts of “over 100” or 60, nor do available documents and program notes from the era."
The Vortex Concerts were held in 1957-1959, not 1960 as often printed (Source: Numerous papers, programs, clippings and press in the Belson Collection at CVM). The films Allures, Yantra and Eneri were not screened at Vortex, only a brief manipulated fragment from an early version of Yantra was used. Interference projector patterns filmed for Vortex were later used in Allures (Source: Jordan Belson; for an in-depth essay regarding Vortex and these films, see Keefer, Cindy. "Cosmic Cinema and The Vortex Concerts," cited above). For a bibliography of articles on Vortex plus other resources, please visit CVM’s Belson Research pages.
Hy Hirsh's name is not spelled with a "c." Source: Hirsh's stamps on his photographs and credits on his films.
Various statements referring to Fischinger's "hand painted films." Fischinger did not make hand painted films, but Harry Smith did and titled one of them "Circular Tensions - Homage to Oskar Fischinger." Thanks to the potential of repeated viral inaccuracy on youtube, a clip of the Harry Smith film placed on youtube has often been spread, posted on blogs and attributed as a film by Oskar Fischinger. We do want to mention there were a very few hand-tinted shots in Fischinger's early 1920s experiments, but he did not make any actual "hand painted films."
Oskar Fischinger wasn't a "Bauhaus artist." He never taught, studied or lectured there, though his films were occasionally screened at the Bauhaus. He also was not Ruttmann's student. (Source for latter: Fischinger correspondence to Richter, 1947, CVM Fischinger collection)
Fischinger was not fired from Paramount or Disney (See Moritz, Optical Poetry; and Fischinger's Paramount resignation letter).
1949 award at Knokke-le-Zoute Festival, Brussels: Fischinger received a prize for Motion Painting no 1. The Whitneys received an award for sound, but NOT the Grand Prize as sometimes reported. Documents and sources forthcoming
Fischinger's film Allegretto was begun at Paramount under the name Radio Dynamics, but not completed there. His final version of Allegretto was completed in 1943. Though many older texts date the film Allegretto as 1936, the film known as Allegretto and in distribution for many decades was completed in 1943. Fischinger was not able to print in color or complete the film in 1936. (Sources: Papers of Oskar Fischinger, William Moritz's Optical Poetry)
Section D: Misc. Articles and Older Publications
Richter, Hans. "A History of the Avantgarde" in Art in Cinema, Frank Stauffacher, Ed., San Francisco, 1946. Contains extensive errors. Richter's film Rhythm 21 was not completed or screened in 1921 (see Jeanpaul Goergen, Hans Richter. Film ist Rhythmus, Berlin, July 2003. Available at Arsenal, Berlin). Richter has pushed the start dates in Art in Cinema of Ruttmann and Fischinger's films to later dates. Ruttmann's Opus 1 was 1921. Fischinger did not start as a painter as Richter writes, and he started making abstract films well before 1929. See the Fischinger Research pages for an Excerpt from 1947 text by Fischinger correcting this account. As Goergen has explained to CVM via email, “The only film by Richter that passed the German censorship and was shown officially and in public was a film called "Film ist Rhythmus" (not preserved under this title) presented at the second screening of the matinee "Der absolute Film" in Berlin, 10. 5. 1925.” Thus the claims of 1921 or 1923 for a Richter film are incorrect. It may even be finally in 1951 that these early Rhythm films were edited and released, according to Goergen.
Moritz, William. “Hy Hirsh and the Fifties” (2001). Re James Whitney and Hy Hirsh. James Whitney’s film Yantra was not screened by Belson, or synchronized to music, at Morrison Planetarium during a Vortex Concert. At a separate, later 1959 event at the San Francisco Museum of Art called "Vortex Presents," Belson did screen Yantra, which was first synchronized then with an excerpt from the “Cain and Abel” soundtrack (Source: Belson interviews, Belson correspondence and "Vortex Presents" program). Re the Hy Hirsh funeral story here - Interviews with Hy Hirsh’s friends from his final Paris years have revealed that Moritz’s story about the many lovers showing up at Hirsh’s funeral, and inspiring a Bergman film, has no basis in fact. Note that Moritz’s texts for the 1990s Absolut Panushka site also contain similar, numerous Vortex, Belson and Whitney errors.
Many of Moritz's earlier visual music-related articles (especially from the 1970s - 90s) contain errata which he later corrected after additional research, or which were later found to be incorrect. Beware early non-annotated Moritz articles online at various sites. Some are even online with incorrect titles and publication citations; a few early drafts containing errors are also presented online as final published articles. It was Moritz's wish that not all of these early articles be placed online. We have begun annotating his articles, starting with some significant errors - visit our online library.
Lukach, Joan. Hilla Rebay: In Search of the Spirit in Art. New York: George Braziller, 1983.
Page 215. Lukach writes that Fischinger's "most-acclaimed film, Motion Painting No. 1" is a film without music. This is incorrect, this film does have music.
Last updated February, 2012
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