Through Wounded Eyes

Overview

"This film is a collaboration between Joel Haertling and Stan Brakhage. It is a hand-painted film incorporating treated film images of trees in Fall colors and scratched film. It has four levels of superimposed image. Inspired by an eye aberration caused by a detached retina, this film approximates what is seen through wounded eyes. The film begins with an eye injury, followed by a multi-color dot pattern that approximates damaged-as-seen-through-a-screen eyesight. A scratch pattern is introduced that is identical with a recurring eye aberration associated with a detached retina. A flowering Agrimony plant appears, the name meaning a wound to the eye. A catharsis is reached at the point that the scratched pattern changes to its negative and transforms to color negative. This introduces other painted and sanded film sequences that resolve the catharsis of incoming images into a visual-world-unto-itself." - Stan Brakhage