In Between Images: Cinematographer Jaroslav Kučera’s Media Practices Kateřina Svatoňová Jaroslav Kučera, Vacation /Prázdniny/, and a series of music videos for Hidden Cinematographer Water Springs /Zaváté studánky/). In the 1960s, he also worked for the experimental theater Jaroslav Kučera (August 6, 1929 – January 11, 1991), Laterna Magika; he had been involved in their second touring undeniably one of the most notable Czech cinematographers, program, which was later banned and their collaboration came from a white-collar family. After he graduated from high abandoned. In the 1980s, Kučera resumed his work with school (1948), he enrolled in the newly-established Faculty of Laterna Magika as a cinematographer (Pragensia), co-director Performing Arts (AMU), with his major being Film Photog- (Black Monk /Černý mnich/) and co-writer (Odysseus). From raphy and Equipment, where he studied from November 2, the 1970s and, especially, during 1980s he participated in its 1948 through his final exam on April 28, 1953.1 From 1952 to international projects (especially German, British and American 1957, he worked as a cameraman at Czechoslovak Army Film, ones), or more specifically, opera and literary adaptations by making short agitprop films with strong ideological messaging director Petr Weigl (Die Nacht aus Blei /Olověná noc/, Maria as some of his earliest works (For a Joyful Life /Za život Stuarda /Mária Stuartová /, Die Reise nach Prag /Mozartova radostný/, A New Shift /Nová směna/, Physical Education cesta do Prahy/, A Village Romeo and Juliet /Romeo a Julie na for Young Teachers /Telovýchova mladých učiteliek/). During vsi/, Dumky), TV series (Theodor Chindler, Wilder Westen, this period, he also shot the short documentary, Army Artistic inclusive), and the short film Zlateh the Goat, an adaptation Theater /Armádní umělecké divadlo/, dedicated to E. F. of a short story by Isaac Bashevis Singer. In 1982 he made his Burian’s theater, and the semi-animated film Central Puppet only, fully auteurist documentary film Prague Castle /Pražský Theater /Ústřední loutkové divadlo/. The Czechoslovak hrad/ for Krátký film, where he acted as the cinematographer, Army Film studio also launched Kučera’s collaboration with scriptwriter and director. The list of films that credit Kučera the director Vojtěch Jasný, namely, the staged documentary shows his broad professional reach, ranging from documentary film It Isn’t Always Cloudy /Není stále zamračeno/. In 1957, films and realistic narratives with an affinity for cinéma vérité, Czechoslovak Film hired Kučera to work at Barrandov Film through music videos, point-of-view features, personal films, Studios. He remained in this job until the end of his life. From (excessively) stylized films that draw inspiration from art and 1968 to 1990 he was also a professor at FAMU’s Department theater aesthetics, and all the way to popular genres. At the of Cinematography, focusing mainly on color cinematography same time, Kučera’s career spanned several periods – from the and color composition. Kučera received many awards both Socialist Realism of the 1950s, critique of its schematism, and at home and abroad (The Cassandra Cat /Až přijde kocour/, the changing sensibility leaning towards the everyday, to the All My Compatriots /Všichni dobří rodáci/, Dinner for “restructuring” and the loosening of norms in the late 1960s, Adele /Adéla ještě nevečeřela/, Death of Fly /Smrt mouchy/, and on to the new normalization and later its gradual disinte- The Day Dawned All the Night /Svítalo celou noc/ and Magic gration. He made his last films in post-1989 Czechoslovakia. Adventure /Kouzelné dobrodružství/); All My Compatriots was awarded by the CST (Supervisory Technical Committee) Kučera’s already extensive body of work has inflated still with at the 22nd Cannes Film Festival; in 1968 he received the state the discovery of his archive that includes magazine clippings, medal for excellent work achievement. Kučera and the director photographs, negatives, transparencies, home movies and Věra Chytilová had two children – Tereza Kučerová, an artist, unpublished dailies, test shots, footage for special effects, as animator, costume designer and actress, and Štěpán Kučera, well as other film material. This discovery has established a cinematographer. Kučera not just as a filmmaker but also as a photographer and intermedia artist. Yet, despite his great range and a variety of During his studies and for a brief period after, Kučera worked approaches and modes, Kučera possessed a distinctive creative mainly with Vojtěch Jasný (in addition to It Isn’t Always style and professional attributes that are fairly recognizable Cloudy, other films include This Will All Be Over Tonight / and – within the context of Czech film – very memorable. Dnes večer všechno skončí/, September Nights /Zářijové noci/, Desire /Touha/, I Survived My Own Death /Přežil jsem svou In order to at least partly illuminate the cinematographer and smrt/, Pilgrimage to the Virgin Mary /Procesí k panence/, The his style, this study will not be restricted merely to film analysis Cassandra Cat, All My Compatriots or Bohemian Rhapsody but it will also explore stages prior to the “end products”. /Česká rapsodie/, a film poem for EXPO 70 in Osaka) and I will attempt to perform “obnaženije prijoma”, i.e., revealing Karel Kachyňa (This Will All Be Over Tonight, The Lost all means and methods that are “used […] in the construction Track /Ztracená stopa/, later he resumed their collaboration of his work”.2 This text will examine the tools, techniques and with Little Mermaid /Malá mořská víla/, Death of Fly). In the practices deployed in Kučera’s work. It also sets out to locate 1960s – following the joint project Pearls of the Deep /Perličky the images themselves, along with their ontological, noetic na dně/ – Kučera began shooting films with the filmmakers and phenomenological properties, as well as their historical of FAMU’s second generation (the Czech New Wave), such aspects, and to absorb the images per se, regardless of what as Jaromil Jireš (Thy Cry /Křik/), Jan Němec (Diamonds of they convey, depict, mirror or critique. More generally, the the Night /Démanty noci/), Ivan Passer (A Boring Afternoon text will also investigate the role, function and perspective of /Fádní odpoledne/), and his wife Věra Chytilová (Daisies / a cinematographer, the relationship to the (moving) image, its 1 As his thesis, Kučera submitted two short Sedmikrásky/, Fruit of Paradise /Ovoce stromů rajských jíme/). genesis as reflected in the discovered archive, as well as the very documentaries Nová směna and Ústřední loutkové Starting in the early 1970s, after a forced career break, he was essence of film and photographic media. divadlo, and a well-received essay entitled Film involved in popular films, most often ideologically-tainted Camera. In his assessment of the thesis, Jaroslav Bouček mentions that it might even be published: comedies. Notably, he worked on several films with the “Jaroslav Kučera’s essay remarkably fulfills its directors Zdeněk Podskalský (A Night at Karlštejn /Noc na The In-betweenness of a Cinematographer main goal of becoming a guide for young camera- Karlštejně/, Christening /Křtiny/, What a Wedding, Uncle! /To men. [...] With a few minor additions, it could well byla svatba, strýčku!/) and Oldřich Lipský (Straw Hat /Slaměný A cinematographer occupies an ambivalent place within the become a textbook about camera basics and it klobouk/, Joachim, Put Him into the Machine! /Jáchyme, film crew. Their task is, to an extent, privileged and the result could be used not just for freshmen but for other hoď ho do stroje/, Hurly-Burly in a Circus /Cirkus v cirkuse/, of their work is the most visible. At the same time, their work students as well.” AMU Archive, FAMU documents, Dinner for Adele). Around this time, he also worked on should remain largely hidden so that the film does not turn folder 66, final state exam reports (provisionally short films and TV entertainment and variety shows (such as into a display of empty visual figures. Though they should not organized). Ploskovice Nocturno /Ploskovické nokturno/, several episodes abandon their own style, cinematographers must subscribe to 2 Bohumil Mathesius, Formální metoda. of the entertainment program Rendezvous /Dostaveníčko/, a certain kind of rigor; they should “erase their own […] way In: Viktor Šklovskij, Teorie prózy (Theory of Prose). musical variety shows A Novel about a Rose /Román o růži/, of seeing and allow for the permeation […] of the generally Melantrich, Praha 1933, p. 255. 348 visual”3 in order to approach not just truthful representation provides the basis of craftsmanship required to maintain image but also higher (aesthetic) qualities of the image of reality. stability in films which do not want to depart from (formal) Cinematographers oscillate between immateriality and materi- norms or (ideological) conventions. Technology, in this sense, ality, illusiveness and reality – they work with matter – sensitive helps to create conventions, i.e., non-directive work routines (in all senses of the word), photographic, celluloid film. On and sets of skills developed by a group of professionals in their the other hand, they also work with the illusions and abstract practice that allow them to standardize their work and make elements which must be inscribed onto the film stock in order it more efficient and faster.7 In the case of cinematographers, for the meaning to be intelligible, the narrative “legible”, and it is the selection of tools (suitable camera and lenses that for the visual aspect to match the original idea. Light, motion, suit the meaning of the shot) and methods (such as lighting, color, time, composition, and depth determine not only the developing)8 that facilitate a clearly coherent image that fits quality of the moving image but also whether viewers are the narrative, which remains uniform in the film’s entirety and allowed to “enter” the film or whether they are denied access. corresponds to traditional, unembellished style. Being both visible and invisible, cinematographers are artists of the moving image as much as they are craftsmen.4 This particular way of approaching the cameraman-technician does not take into account the original “technology” and its Cinematographers have experience with various kinds of origin of techné which is much closer to filmmakers who claim team collaboration, yet in the case of somebody as creative that “[m]odern film defies conventions both in its subject and strong-minded as Kučera, a specific aesthetic vision can matter and form.”9 Technology/techné in this sense means impede the director’s individual effort. Kučera was better (and originally meant simply) not doing and utilizing tools but known as an artist who opened up a dialogue and brought in “revealing, uncovering the truth of things that is hidden. Tech- new ideas which were later developed during the shoot. In his nology is fruitful not by ‘creating’ but by acting in places that case, we can either talk about an equal contribution authorship uncover the truth.”10 Techné is very closely related to epistémé, of multiple individuals, which relies on a common vision of in that it is art which employs a variety of art forms in order the filmmakers (especially Kučera’s collaboration with Věra to uncover that which does not uncover itself. Attempting to Chytilová, Vojtěch Jasný, and Petr Weigl), or about individual restore this function to technology, Sibylle Krämer and Horst authorship in the context of a collective process, in which the Bredekamp demonstrate that culture relinquished its original director has the final say and acts as the supervisor, yet other manual foundation and that the “shift to language” – the hege- colleagues from other departments also make key artistic mony of linguistic analysis and textual hermeneutics – robbed contributions (such as in collaborations with Juraj Herz and images of their epistemic power. It is precisely the original Oldřich Lipský).5 dimension of techné – with regard to Krämer and Bredeka- mp’s theories – that allows one to implement a creative gesture The very definition of the cinematographer’s occupation is that is far from being a mere recording, which was crucial for 3 Jean-François Lyotard, Idea svrchovaného filmu problematized by the commission-based nature of camera work Kučera, but also restores the original role of technology related (The Idea of a Sovereign Film). In: Návrat a jiné and by the duties of an employee at a state-run company; as to the quest for truth, getting familiar with the world, and eseje. Praha: Herrmann & synové 2002, p. 110. a result, Kučera was not able to reject the burden of employee searching for the original. 4 This problematic position can be best illustrated obligations and choose only projects that would be to his using the film Pearls of the Deep, for which Jaro- liking. Commissions can be bad, unchallenging, or ideologically Since Kučera did not merely implement other people’s ideas, slav Kučera shot five different short films by five unacceptable. The only free space (if we disregard technical his work represents the overlap of technology and techné. If different directors, each governed by different limitations) was restricted to private or unofficial/semi-official we view him as a mere “technician” in the original sense of the poetic styles and techniques of adaptation. work – whether it be private experiments, home movies (using word, the resulting portrait would be somewhat reductive, but Despite the stark differences, Kučera retained his the widely accessible 16mm film), or film ideas pitched to it would be just the same if we claim he was an artist drawing specific style in all five films. directors who would either accept them or turn them down. on techné. Technology and techné are inevitably two sides 5 Paisley Livingston distinguishes between four of the same coin, as theorized in a text co-written by Kučera types of authorship: individual; joint authorship The technical basis of camera work, or the perception of equip- and his colleague Kališ where they set out to show that, while among multiple persons working as equals; joint ment of cinematography as such, also cannot be discounted. camera craft cannot do without basic skills, it must also go authorship among multiple persons working as Once we tie cinematographer’s efforts to their equipment, in beyond these skills. “Craft, in the sense of being able to control equals in the context of a collective filmmaking today’s sense of the word, the cinematographer becomes an complex camera and lighting equipment and technology process; and individual authorship in the context engineer who keeps trying to improve the tools which would of photographic processes, is a necessary prerequisite. In of a collective filmmaking process. Paisley Livingston, Cinema, Philosophy, Bergman. On Film as make his work easier and bring him closer to the end product. his creative work, a cinematographer needs to subject their Philosophy. Oxford: Oxford University Press 2009, Since modernity, this purpose has been ascribed to technology intention to the spirit of the screenplay shooting concept.”11 pp. 72–76. and it is closely tied to the industrial revolution, motivated by the desire to maximize man’s power over nature. It can lead Thanks to his approach to his work and in relation to the basic 6 Jaroslava Pešková, Technika a myšlení o tech- to a performative display of the importance of production and definition of the cinematographer’s position – Kučera found nice. In: Průmysl a technika v novodobé české kultuře. Praha: Ústav teorie a dějin umění ČSAV performance. himself in a very dynamic interspace. His position reflected the 1988, pp. 9–16. tension between service (technician/craftsman) and creative Technology as such contributes to the continuous develop- gesture (artist), between a style affected by the script and his 7 Howard S. Becker, Art as Collective Action. ment of the organization of human force as well as to the individual style, between individuality and team work, between American Sociological Review 39, 1974, no. 6, pp. 770–774. development of tools. Technology becomes a self-contained process flow and stoppage, between development, constant exploitation of both nature and man,6 mechanical and change and the result, stabilized image, method, between 8 Similar to photographers – for more details, mechanized work with no individual expression. The the documentary filmmaker, novelist, and the visualist poet. see Barbara Rosenblum, Photographers at Work: abstraction of technology, formalization, and construction Kučera’s lifelong affinity for fine art only added more layers A Sociology of Photographic Styles. New York: has a definite impact on art–providing inspiration to abstract to this ambivalence. One must also keep in mind his position Holmes & Meier 1978. art on the one hand, as well as realism on the other, which between giving preference to visuality and tools used in fine 9 Jan Kališ – Jaroslav Kučera, Filmová fotografie can also be viewed as largely mechanical and schematic. For art and between the search for a specific film language. His a její funkce. Ročenka čs. filmu 1961, p. 60. the cinematographer, this aspect of technology is, of course, work was very often located between tradition and modernity, 10 Jaroslava Pešková, Technika a myšlení significant – the camera’s technical equipment, lighting nostalgia and experiment, landscape art and subjectivity, o technice. In: Průmysl a technika v novodobé české equipment, the technology of the photographic processes, and snapshot and portrait, moving and static image, traditional and kultuře. Praha: Ústav teorie a dějin umění ČSAV each’s advancement allows cameramen not only to record the kinetic composition. 1988, p. 15. surrounding scene and landscape, but also gives them a sense 11 Jan Kališ – Jaroslav Kučera, Filmová fotografie of personal improvement. The work of a cinematographer a její funkce. Ročenka čs. filmu 1961, p. 55. is, to an extent, shaped by technology, yet technology also 349 Media Practices of a Cinematographer individual image planes, and an intertextual dimension. An internally dynamic image contains both the place from which Just as the cinematographer’s work is hard to define, shots things can be viewed, as well as the counterpoint, i.e., the and continuously transformed images are equally elusive, anticipated reaction, another gaze which the image is directed especially in the case of an essential experimenter like Jaroslav to and materialized in. It is also crucial to understand point of Kučera. Yet they may be unique precisely for being ambivalent, view as a particular approach to life/art or as the overlapping ephemeral, and also very dynamic. In order to grasp at least of photography technique and more or less stylized reality some features of the film(ed) image and to shed some light on within the given medium. the perspective of a cinematographer as opposed to that of a director, I will not use tools that are designed and suitable The position of the cinematographer, especially as exemplified for the analysis of completed works. Rather, I will draw upon by Jaroslav Kučera, can also be understood from the perspec- German philosophy and media theory, namely Bernhard tive of a new ontology which no longer investigates the very Siegert, who claims it is misleading to talk about and use existence of depicted objects but rather attempts to figure out closed media terms but, instead, that it is necessary to consider their localization– i.e., it does not matter what they are but operations and practices which are more directly tied to the where they are located. very process of creation rather than the end product.12 With regard to this point, it seems crucial to analyze the end film Kučera’s approach and the way in which he tried to avoid not as a result but as a creative process, one that shapes a new visual stereotypes, strict conventions and pursued experimen- perspective of the world, or that constructs and conceptualizes tation (both with the material and techniques) recall another the world/truth/reality anew. While defining and searching of Uspensky’s terms, ostraneniye. Commonly and misleadingly media operations, “mediality” is much more important than translated as defamiliarization, this concept includes a spatial media features, to think (with) (technical) image and about aspect17 – as the original Russian term suggests, it is a side view image is more important than its implementation, image perfor- or, in this case, a view from behind the (still) camera. Though mativity and the (technical) image are more important than an the cameraman stands in the center of the picture, he also uses image’s textual, semiotic, narratological, and motivic nature.13 the camera to keep his distance, viewing the scene from the While the author’s thought process is naturally unknowable, side, testing the ideal camera shot, reflecting the initial perspec- I will use these theories to reconstruct the “thinking” of the tive, point of view. Ostraneniye and point of view show how medium, i.e., the thought process that is visible in the image strongly this category is inscribed into individual layers of the and gets developed on its formal foundation. This process can composition and how closely the concept is tied to perception be captured using the “archeological” research of the cyclical of the world and its new recreation, both in the aesthetic and relationship between the resulting images and the private the philosophical sense. To set a photograph/image into motion archive that contains inspiration, traces, studies, reflections, then not only allows for another level of “defamiliarization” and analyses which can become the foundation of creative in the perception of the world but for the multiplication of work and that are reflected in the publicly presented image; individual planes and film frames. Where it used to be possible I will also use the interdisciplinary perspective as proposed by to experiment with space within the image, it is now possible to Mieke Bal’s “traveling concepts” and by related theorists who experiment with the space of an image. use them to analyze various cultural phenomena. They consider thinking and culture not as permanent and clearly defined The experimental, ever-changing moving image is very elusive, territories but as dynamic and changeable processes. “Handling especially during turbulent periods of political and social things” within the context of this dynamic points out to transformations. In light of media practices and formalist cultural techniques14 that allow connecting cultural and techni- approachs, it is vital to think of the experiment not in terms of 12 Kateřina Krtilová, Dějiny médií a média dějin. cal perspectives both of which are essential and indivisible for its end result but rather as a creative process which is trying to Rozhovor s Bernhardem Siegertem. Iluminace Vol. 23, 2011, Issue 2, pp. 104–105. a cinematographer. They also reflect tension produced by (non) form a new outlook on the world – a process that constructs individuality and (in)dependence in this occupation because and conceptualizes the world/truth/reality anew – and also to 13 Sybille Krämer – Horst Bredekamp, Kultur, cultural techniques “unlike production relationships, are not see experimentation as a different/alternative way of thinking Technik, Kulturtechnik. Wider die Diskursivierung inaccessible owing to pragmatic or ideological reasons. On the (with) media. Similarly, shooting a film is more of an operation der Kultur. In: Sybille Krämer – Horst Bredekamp (eds.), Bild – Schrift – Zahl. München: Fink 2003, other hand, like management techniques they are never merely which is engaged in looking. The task of a cinematographer lies pp. 11–13. individual.”15 Media practices and cultural techniques seem in the intersection of these practices, as it is defined by thinking to provide a possibility of exploring the position of a cinema- through images and making them visible while capturing the 14 Sybille Krämer and Horst Bredekamp do not tographer as such (not in the sense of historical-sociological filmmaking process or later modifying it. We then begin to define culture statically but examine its dynamic analysis), as well as the image itself (and its motion), free from identify a set of media operations typical for a cinematogra- nature and focus on identifying its basic features and changeability. Sybille Krämer – Horst literary, semiotic, or narratological tradition and authorship pher: searching and collecting, looking, recording and later Bredekamp, Kultur, Technik, Kulturtechnik. Wider theories. experimenting (in the sense of looking for new ways and die Diskursivierung der Kultur. In: Sybille Krämer – modifying the footage). Over his entire career, Kučera focused Horst Bredekamp (eds.), Bild – Schrift – Zahl. Unlike texts analyzing the work of a director or a screenwriter, on translating his experience with visuality and imagination München: Fink 2003, pp. 11–22. this approach to a cinematographer’s perspective allows us to into the (film) image. The resulting image was not intended to 15 Friedrich Kittler, Předmluva. Zapisovací perceive films – and the period’s visual style – from the very be merely an execution of cinematographic conventions but systémy 1800/1900 (Introduction. Discourse Net- center as well as “from the side”. The cinematographer’s eye, of a new, autonomous means of expression, a different way of works 1800/1900). In: Kateřina Krtilová – Kateřina imprinted in the final image, does not reflect just one perspec- thinking/seeing/perception. Svatoňová (eds.), Medienwissenschaft. Východiska tive but ties together several perspectives. The crucial one is a aktuální pozice německé filosofie a teorie médií. the point of view (tochka zreniya) as found in the work of Praha: Academia 2016, p. 204. Boris Uspensky, which cannot be related just to narratological 16 Boris Uspenskij, Poetika kompozice (A Poetics of focalization but which includes a functional and compositional Composition). Brno: Host, 2008. For more details, dimension of the text or, in this case, image.16 Point of view – see my text co-written with Libuše Heczková: „Ak- perspective, camera angle and composition – includes a starting tualizace“ Poetiky kompozice aneb Boris Uspenskij point (tochka) from which the view is executed, and a space z několika hledisek. Svět literatury Vol. 21, 2011, that opens up by recording on the film medium. The resulting Issue 1., pp. 114–124. photograph/film is considered an aesthetic object, spectacle, 17 For more on these terms, see also Libuše Hec- or a construct rather than a document, yet it also involves zková – Kateřina Svatoňová, Sentimentální cesta. dialogism as defined by Mikhail Bakhtin. The space of the In: Ivan Klimeš – Jan Wiendl (eds.), Kultura a totali- medium includes the initial perspective, relationships between ta III. Revoluce. Praha, FF UK 2015, pp. 183–200. 350 Searching, Collecting Kučera clearly did not try to follow a specific photographic and Preserving: tradition. Yet, if we attempted to pick a label for his work, we could identify associations with “new realism”. New A Cinematographer’s Archive realism is manifested especially in moments that reveal the materiality or performativity of images, i.e., in the “pop Although Kučera dedicated himself to most cultural and media art” color images of various peeled-off posters and rusty practices, it is convenient to consider them chronologically in surfaces, in the photographs of pedestrians streaming through keeping with the standard order of film production, i.e., first the city, and of nighttime city captured with long exposure. exploring the media practices of searching and collecting that Most of Kučera’s photographs approach the style of “poetry/ constitute his private archives and precede a film shoot.18 photography of the everyday”, which we can trace in Czech photography from the late 1950s (Kučera’s photographs can be Throughout his life, Kučera collected fragments of found compared to photographers such as Boris Baromykin, Bohuslav objects, including rusty sheets of metal, cigarette butts, glass Burian, Jiří Jeníček, Jan Dezort, Soňa Soukupová, and Pavel bottles, various pictures, newspaper cutouts, mostly photo- Dias). Kučera’s photographs also capture urban life and its graphs, slides and (mostly 16mm) film. Side by side, we find features, including buildings, modern elements, construction, photographs of paintings from art history, of posters and every- trams and in a similar way highlight the everyday and lyricism. day life, images of urban and countryside landscape, details His photographs were not deformed or altered in any way and of textures and abstract ornaments; there are both figural and were mostly done with a 50mm lens. non-figural pictures, high- and low-brow, natural and artificial. Kučera’s collection had some of the features of a modern Kučera’s “microstudies” or “macrostudies” of the everyday archive (though his collection was not created as an archive are equally remarkable. He did not just photograph framed per se, as it was not systematically classified and organized). wholes of everyday reality, but also depicted the outside reality Modern archives do not care as much about preserving history, and its internal rhythm and order, especially with photographs traces of memory, or facts as they do about the conditions and of dilapidated or emerging buildings, old posters peeling off, processes related to collecting and searching. This collection flaking walls and rusty sheets of metal. Kučera took pictures can be thought of as a catalog; Kučera used these images in of textures (most often in large detail) on various surfaces, and his work in order to create new connections. In this kind of their transitions and combinations, best noticeable on peeling collection, the original mnemonic function is replaced by the posters, but also large wholes of landscape textures, geometric pragmatic one. An archive designed to be recycled carries structures and patterns (netting, bricks, scaffolding, rows of only the memory of the experiment, not historical memory, cars, fragments of human bodies), recorded reflections, glim- open to its own destruction in return for new experiments. An mers and fragments, which shifted Kučera into the non-visual archive requires continuous recontextualization of objects, and field as well. These photographs very often show moments in their irretrievable destruction, in favor of a new image, with which realistic space falls apart, emerges and vanishes, takes a changeable structure (depending on the owner or curator); in on more layers and transformations. Kučera’s geometrical- these archives, meanings and historical connections are residual ly-structured images, lines and grids resemble Avant-garde and potential rather than permanent and current.19 photography, at the same time they are close to an art movement which emerged in the 1960s Czech art scene – “new If the search and collection of images was even recorded, it sensitivity” as represented by Jiří Kolář, Karel Malich and was often only in the form of the media practice itself – as Zdeněk Sýkora, and may also recall older photographs by Jiří un-materialized potentiality; from a large part of the developed Toman and contemporaneous photographs of Miroslav Hák, material, no transparencies were made, there is just the negative Emila Medková and Vojtěch Sapara. Kučera’s fascination with photographic film or slides. In most cases, the photographic tactile images, structure, surface and relief was also close to the image as an artifact suitable for a traditional archive was not then influential Art Informel as exemplified in photography by important to Kučera but a view, the moment and possibility of Emila Medková, in art by Mikuláš Medek, Jan Koblasa, Jan copying, or the possibility of analyzing a framed view, reality. Kotík and Vladimír Boudník, and in film by Jan Švankmajer. Thanks to the photographic process, it was possible to capture, These compositions show the frequently depicted reality cut out and freeze some of the features of the outside world, internally “flaking” and “fading”. To an extent, these captured whether it be light, lines, color, texture or space, that could be objects are personified, and they are either themselves active, analyzed further. Only thanks to the analyses of the recorded or bear traces of activity belonging to a subject that remains light was he able to create a solid studio environment or to outside the frame. They can (unconsciously or incidentally) use exterior lighting to fit the mood of the film. Exploration speak of human actions that are made passive, brought down of colors and the ways they affect a photograph or a slide was to the level of mechanical tasks or condemned to inactivity.20 the basis for his creation of color compositions for individual scenes, studies of framed space helped to resolve issues with Images composed in such a way, containing fragments and 18 Jaroslav Brabec also takes note of Kučera’s col- perspective. Kučera utilized representation, framing, immobility ruptures, can have a powerful impact; they can surprise lecting habit, yet instead of an archive, he and isolation to “learn” to see, and created a wealth of and “pierce” us, like the Barthesian punctum.21 This is mentions “an inconspicuous notebook”. Jaroslav material to be used not just for other works but for other media Roland Barthes’s term for places in a photograph that are Brabec, Mimoverbální komunikace barevných practices. “uncultivated”, unchained, and unexpected, filled with latent vztahů. Academic lecture, May 2015, FAMU, Prague. potentiality. The viewer’s eye can be attracted to look at 19 Allan Sekula, Výklad archivu (On the Invention these surprises in the photograph that can produce affects. of Photographic Meaning). In: Karel Císař (ed.), Jaroslav Kučera, Photographer For Kučera though, photographs were not important for the Co je to fotografie? Praha: Herrmann & synové punctum, or strong emotions in response to an image, but 2004, pp. 295–298. If we look at Kučera’s visual archive in greater detail, it is for allowing studium, as Barthes called his second approach 20 Věra Linhartová’s interpretation of Emila apparent that Kučera’s negatives, photographs, slides and to photography. Kučera focused on rational aspects of Medková’s photographs are structured in a similar home movies display multiple (counter)movements, thematic photography, exploring details that raised his interest, active way as Kučera’s photographs. Věra Linhartová, shifts, and reflect several cultural techniques – they oscillate reception, watching their encoding, yet not in relation to Soustředné kruhy. Články a studie z let 1962–2002. between realism and abstraction or geometrization, between an content but rather in relation to the process of recording, to the Praha: Torst 2010, pp. 297–298. arranged pose and a snapshot, between singularity and seriality, materialization of the gaze. He focused on professional aspects 21 Roland Barthes, Světlá komora. Poznámky or sequence making. These images involve constant interplay of photography that led him to the constant need to capture k fotografii (Camera Lucida). Praha: Agite/Fra between different media, interconnections between the moving various qualities of outside reality, to record surfaces as well 2005, pp. 31–61. and still image, photographic and film/media techniques. as internal movement, rhythm and perspective of structures. 351 He observed the qualities of materials and three-dimensional with the same subject.25 Sequences and series may have been objects in relation to flat photograph, or to the possibilities of interesting for Kučera precisely because they drew on the same representation/construction of “naturalness” and “authentic- media practices and principles as film. Shifts between individual ity”, or to strengthen the dramatic effect using film. images on sequences were either due to temporal reasons, based on a shift of the camera in space or a change in perspective, Interest in the structural order of things and qualities of the or – unusually for a sequence – due to a different exposure recorded matter was complemented by other themed sets of or filter (and shot for the purpose of testing equipment and photographs drawing on nature, living organisms, counter- material). Regardless of the reason, these images mostly recall points to urban life that traced his interest in landscape art and snapshots, carrying a moment of reflection as well as differ- lyricism. Kučera captured plants, fields and meadows, sea and entiation constituting cinematic visuality. The main defining clouds, organic details, floating clouds or fragments of human feature of photographic sequences is not (thematic, temporal bodies. Aesthetic proximity to the urban shots is apparent – yet or spatial) identification but rather difference as defined by the nature shots allow a glimpse and study another aspect of Deleuze.26 Images with minimal differences repeat themselves, recorded reality – color. As he recreated the perspective of forming sets with a particular internal rhythm whereby the notable painters, Kučera explored color tones and contrasts, tension between being static and dynamic shifts them closer to qualities of the color spectrum, relationship between color films or – owing to non-narrativity and highlighted fragmenta- and light, harmony and unsettling tension that are the most tion as opposed to continuity – to afilms.27 prominent in nature. Since everything in nature has a color, it can be observed for the ways harmony is created and individual Difference of a figurative kind is typical for snapshots that color shades are put together. “Every color we see in nature produce cinematic illusion. Difference multiplies the possibil- around us indirectly recalls a complementary color as well… ities of media transposition, furthering application in moving To have sunlit colors in a painting that should be enjoyed images (especially those which Kučera shot frame by frame to in a dim room, not only must the grass be green but it must create non-cinematic, unnatural, choppy movement),28 and contain the complementary red to make it vibrate.”22 The way possibilities for other interpretations – as common in abstract that modern painters approached analysis of individual color and conceptual art. Series of photographs in the photography components in nature and their composition was very similar archive upset its chaotic order, constituting homogeneous to Kučera’s studium. His photographs served to explore these and interconnected sets that cannot be broken down into connections in detail, to consider boosting color “vibrations” individual photos but in which individual photos follow from in his own film work. the previous ones, thus attesting to their cinematic continuity and connectedness. Color helps in providing structure to space and in adding depth to a shot in a much more striking way than structures designed Owing to these methods, Kučera’s realism went through an explicitly using perspective. Kučera’s photographic images inner transformation; to a certain degree, it came close to 22 As argued by Merleau-Ponty in his interpreta- (including his moving images) very often oscillated between stylization and formalism, and it was this countermotion tion of Cézanne. Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Cézanno- a precisely composed pose and a random snapshot.23 It would that defined his film work. On the one hand, Kučera’s images vo pochybování (Cezanne’s Doubt). Orientace Vol. 5, seem that for Kučera – who often sought inspiration in art moved closer to possible identification, truth, and the authen- 1970, Issue 2, pp. 38–39. history – pose, as an element derived from painting, would be ticity of images which had already lost it, on the other hand 23 Thierry de Duve, Póza a momentka, neboli a natural form of expression. Some of his portraits, landscape they also gravitated to difference and allowed for the creation Fotografický paradox (Pose et instantané, ou photographs and social or surreal compositions reveal the of a parallel, alternative space. Abstract and abstracting images Le paradoxe photographique). In: Karel Císař arranged photographic-painting canvas, the decisive moment cannot be viewed as being in contrast to realism but rather as (ed.), Co je to fotografie? Praha: Herrmann with central perspective. While these stylized “un-modern” having a complementary role; they share the same functions & synové 2004, pp. 273–293. Cf. Gilles Deleuze, spatial designs are quite scarce in Kučera’s photography, they and consequences and frequently blend into a single correlative Film 1. Obraz-pohyb (Cinema 1: Movement Image). form very particular breaks in his film work – the nearly whole. Praha: NFA 2000, p. 12. Cf. Karel Císař, Fotografie motionless arrangements which freeze the cinematic time, jako konceptuální umění. Sešit pro umění, teorii accentuating the space that opens up to new meanings. Infused with fascinating anonymity, Kučera’s photographs and a příbuzné zóny Vol. 5, 2011, Issue 11, s. 30–39. Transferring photographic body of work to film does not slides were in no way motivated by the need to keep a system- Karel Císař, Abeceda věcí. Poznámky k modernímu a současnému umění. Praha: UMPRUM 2014, esp. represent so much a nod towards tradition as it does a moment atic record and archive. Instead, they were a specific medium of pp. 133–144. of departure, singularity and a break from the conventions perspective and reflection. Indeed, his approach problematizes of the given medium. A snapshot, then, occupies the opposite or multiplies the nature of the medium. Photographs establish 24 Gilles Deleuze, Film 1. Obraz-pohyb (Cinema 1: position; it is a moment selected from an inexorable flow two types of mediality, as discussed by Christoph Hubig.29 Movement Image). Praha: NFA 2000, pp. 13–14. of time that fits in with Kučera’s effort to find “reality”, to The first one is external, objective mediality, in which the 25 Jeff Wall uses these two terms to differentiate reveal the truth and the moment of authenticity, to capture medium determines what is possible, visible and serves as between sets of photographs capturing either a testimony. Gilles Deleuze shows that a snapshot (similarly to evidence, information and communication. The other one is the same object from multiple views, or multiple a stiff pose in film) can create singularity (qualitative jumps) internal mediality, in which the medium opens up a space of objects from a single view. Jeff Wall, „Marks of thanks to the collection and accumulation of ordinary events possibilities, allowing for reflection of a particular type of Indifference“. Aspects of Photography in, or as (quantitative process). Selection of the unique is made from Conceptual Art. In: Ann Goldstein – Anne Rorimer representation, communication about what is seen, exploration (eds.), Reconsidering the Object of Art, 1965–1975. the random.24 According to Deleuze, randomness allows and manipulation of reality, while technically expanding the Los Angeles: Museum of Contemporary Art 1995, snapshot to offer more perspectives and multiplicities, and potential of the medium and the photograph. In this definition, pp. 247–267, Reprinted in: FOGLE, Last Picture snapshot also precedes film that is a sequence of random photographs – and the entire archive – serve not only as a piece Show. pp. 32–44. moments that simulate motion and continuity. Film is based of information, an aesthetic object and as the foundation for 26 Gilles Deleuze, Difference and Repetition. New on interspaces between images of photographic snapshots that further work, but as a way to reflect the media situation as York: Columbia University Press, 1994. First repeat. Figurative differences that are generated between them a whole, to reflect possibilities presented by photography or published in French in 1968. ultimately evoke – conscious and invisible – sense of movement. film, to explore one’s own borders and limitations, as well as gaps, which can be expanded and the final image improved. 27 The term afilm follows Lyotard’s term acinema. Im-movable structures also correspond to the fact that Kučera Jean-François Lyotard, Acinema. In: Andrew E. Benjamin (ed.), The Lyotard Reader. Oxford: Black- experimented largely in between images rather than with the well Publishers 1989, pp. 169–180. photographic image, although the goal was again studium, not the final set of images. Instead of individual photographs, 28 The same method was used for home movies. Kučera often created sequences, spreading out time continuity 29 Christopher Hubig, Die Kunst des Möglichen 1. and capturing multiple views of a single object, or series – Technikphilosophie als Reflexion der Medialität. photographs of different objects in identical compositions and Bielefeld: Transcript 2006. 352 Film Photography who specialized in creative work with color. The first gener- ation of cameramen were also heavily influenced by teachers The practices of searching, collecting and looking are prerequi- who focused on equipment, such as Jindřich Brichta, Josef site for a creative cinematographer like Jaroslav Kučera. They Hrdlička, Karel Köhn, or the make-up artist Gustav Hrdlička. are the foundation, basis, and paradigm that can feed other Yet although this new generation of camera professionals found work. These often intersect with media practices from other much to learn about the conventions of cinematography, their fields, especially ones that involve space and record of space, teachers’ influence, with regards to shooting style, was much like architects and artists. Together they form a mise-en-scène, weaker. At the same time, foreign cinema strongly resonated the space in a film. Yet the cinematographer is also responsible with the students – A. M. Brousil, FAMU’s Rector, organized for the film space, which requires a more specific level of work regular film screenings of international films which were not that involves spatial cutouts, snapshot sequences. This type of released in theaters, and invited a roster of remarkable lectur- work is again close to photography practices, as favored by ers, such as director Vsevolod Pudovkin, Giuseppe de Santis, Kučera. documentary filmmaker Joris Ivens, film theorist, critic and screenwriter Béla Balász, screenwriter and neorealism theorist Kučera’s practices and techniques must be studied in Cesare Zavattini, or actors Simone Signoret, Yves Montand, accordance with technical and technological development as Gerard Philippe, and others. The first camera students learned well as with (Kučera’s) idea of the “right” image, its norm the basics of their job largely around the studio films which and tradition. The career of a state employee must also be were already considered lifeless, while they encountered correlated to the social transformations and (politically a legacy of lyrical filmmaking and the Czech cinematography motivated) institutional changes. Whereas an artist’s archive school which provided inspiration for exterior filmmaking and creates particular typological sets and is, to a great extent, landscape cinematography. They discovered neorealism, while continuous, Kučera’s official work is frequently marked by being confronted with the constraints of Socialist Realism, and discontinuity, regardless of his own creative coherence, and the tension between the two had an impact on their early work. persistent drive to find new forms. To achieve better under- standing of Kučera’s ideas about image, I will focus on specific Filmmakers of the new generation were busy studying the techniques and formal devices that were typical for Kučera and principles of film language and honing their technical skills, yet contributed to a specific atmosphere and recognizable style. they also set out to find their own styles in order to set them- I am not interested in providing an exhaustive description of all selves apart from prewar film – they opted for new devices, Kučera’s films but in identifying practices that would elucidate protested against the standardized studio model, applied new his methods and thought. techniques, and moved away from photography as the basis for filmmaking, such as with the Avant-garde photographers and cinematographers Jiří Jeníček, Jiří Lehovec, and Alexander “New Shift”: Requirements for a New Hackenschmied. According to the first FAMU generation, Generation of Cinematographers cinematography should express a specific style developed in accordance with the philosophy and aesthetic outlook of Kučera’s sensitivity, taste and talent were formed in the difficult a given cinematographer.30 period of the 1950s, at a time when a new norm – unifying and objectivizing – was being enforced, in response to the During the 1950s, strict norms were slowly loosened. In the postwar subject crisis and the emerging totalitarian system. relatively free space of FAMU and, paradoxically, Czechoslovak Between the Czech coup in February 1948 and the end of the Army Film, which did not belong under the centralized film Stalin cult in the mid-1950s, the norm and official art style industry and where Kučera made his first films, these changes was defined by Socialist Realism which allowed few deviations were much more dramatic. It seemed apparent that norms and variations, in art that rejected formalism and aestheticized could not remain static and unchangeable and that they would image and, instead, promoted basic ideological patterns in the have to “oscillate between general demands and ‘model’ script, themes and motifs, as well as in the narration. It also individual expression”.31 Gradually, modern art was making adopted stereotypical characters, schematic expression and the its return and artists starting reintroducing various creative idea of a unified national culture born of the intersection of approaches without settling on a single model, although in Soviet models, Czech folk culture, and 19th century tradition. retrospect it might seem otherwise. The shift to the topics and aesthetics of the 19th century was apparent mainly in literature and fine art, while film was still searching for its new form. At the same time, it was consid- (Additional) Lighting: Light-Shadow ered among the key art forms/media that would be able to as the Basic Device successfully represent and disseminate the required norms. With regard to form, the main inspiration was the Soviet montage In the second half of the 1950s, cameramen focused on school, while in terms of the subject matter it promoted techniques tied to the staging of the space in front of the engaged optimism and critique of anti-regime opposition. camera and on the very recording of action. As some of their Czech cinema was strongly influenced by several institutional chief instruments, they endeavored to “work with light and transformations: establishment of FAMU in November 1946, selection of material surfaces in front of the camera” as well postwar centralization of the industry, and the founding of the as “work on the agreed concept for the final visual style”.32 Czechoslovak State Film. Light allowed for the creation of new image concepts, spatial arrangements, and different visual “storytelling” than used in 30 Josef Illík, in: Jan Čuřík – Josef Illík – Jan Kališ – Jaroslav Kučera entered this (cinematic) situation as a student prewar film, especially in genre films suppressing expressive Jaroslav Kučera, Kameramani za filmovým stolem. in one of the then three opened courses – film photography light atmosphere. And it was lighting, the right selection in Film a doba Vol. 7, 1961, Issue 7, p. 452. and equipment at FAMU. He was accepted and received tonal gradation and actual surface tonality, light-tonal concept, 31 Jiří Brabec, Estetická norma a historie litera- strong support from Karel Plicka who was a great inspira- and linear image composition which were used to dramatize tury v totalitních systémech. In: Zlatá šedesátá. tion to Kučera mainly for his landscape and ethnographic the subject matter and meaning or to elevate creative use of Česká literatura a společnost v letech tání, kolotání photography. Other professors in the department included spatiality and texture. The mechanics of lighting remained a... zklamání. Praha: Ústav pro českou literaturu Karel Degl, Václav Hanuš, Václav Huňka, Jan Stallich, known associated with the technical aspects of the field, yet creative AV ČR 2000, p. 15. as a measured supporter of traditional methods and studio light compositions allowed for the blending of the artisanal 32 Jaromír Šofr, Teorie a praxe světlotonální lighting, Jaroslav Tuzar who taught creative lighting, Vladimír and artistic sides. Only a combination of the two sides, which koncepce filmu. Praha: NAMU 2013, p. 9. Novotný, a special effects expert; and later Ferdinand Pečenka, recalls techné, achieved the unified whole that makes the film 353 coherent, supplies an internal purpose and expressiveness, and subject matter to create a tactile image, yet without drawing is an imprint of a distinctive style.33 all of the attention. We encounter nighttime and interior scenes with clearly artificial lighting, not of the classical type, but Kučera also explored lighting possibilities and it was clear that with elements of Expressionist, expressive and Neo-Baroque he was looking for an image that would fit the subject matter, style that contributes in creating an atmosphere of fear and not a set norm or convention. Even in Kučera’s early films, threat. Modulating light affects our sense of the flow of time, we can see a specific approach to light that constitutes two which is always subjective and selective. Dramatic lighting, basic positions followed by Kučera throughout his career. In strong contrast, and backlighting alternate with the symbolic accordance with other film devices, lighting was determined half-shadows but also atypical diffuse lights and unusual either by modern expression leaning to documentary film, color composition that does not always respect diegetic light or to a Neo-Baroque or expressive style reminiscent of the sources or is hyperbolized – light “adds the unrealness of its contrast lighting in Avant-garde film; on the one hand, it arrangement to the real world of forms”, enriches the image, was an image leaning towards authenticity, realism, (pseudo) and amplifies the film’s oppressive message.35 A very diverse, documentary style of cinéma vérité, on the other hand, their “cineplastic”36 shaping points out the basic function of light strong stylization and meticulous “painterly compositions” in postwar film, as defined by Henri Alekan: “Light is both drew upon lyrical tradition. Kučera’s first documentary films a constructive and disruptive element that is able to break and films blending documentary and fiction were shot in the up the monotony of the surface, highlight areas of interest, exterior (Physical Education for Young Teachers, A New Shift redistribute and rhythmicize, and create a range of plasticity, and most of For a Joyful Life) using diffused, homogeneous both physically and mentally”.37 In the film I Survived My light – the aim was to apply a neutral visual style to present the Own Death, Kučera works with light effects, both direct ones film’s main theme. Any dramatization and highlighting relied which focus our attention along with the camera movement more on the movement and angle of the camera. This lighting and artistic composition, and aestheticizing ones that set the concept lacks temporal clues and makes images more banal, yet rhythm between individual image planes and reveal what also more crisp. On the contrary, Army Artistic Theater, a film would otherwise be invisible elements in the field of view. made for the twentieth anniversary of the E. F. Burian Theater To combine two different light-shadow approaches affects the and shot mainly in the interior, made ample use of expressive way the film oscillates between the naturalist and the stylized, modulation lighting in connection with the prerequisites of hallucinatory position. traditional lighting, i.e., dramatization, hierarchization and legibility. The ideological tone of the film was amplified by The end of the 1960s saw a departure from the theatrical spot lights, while the drama in some shots was supplied by demands in lighting and a shift towards documentary style, dominant black tones. The undeniably agitprop message was as seen in Neorealist films and, especially, New Wave and also aided by a rhythmically arranged collage of authentic shots cinéma vérité films. For example, “urban” films such as Rainy and photographs. These formal methods recalled prewar Avant- Day /Deštivý den/, Party Shoes /Střevíčky/ and The Cry work garde aesthetic in Czech theater, based on language experiment, with largely unmanipulated, natural light or its diffusion, and mediality, materiality and performativity but also Soviet Avant- light is no longer loaded with additional meanings; the image garde cinema with its light contrasts, alternating wide shots and is naturalist with no added effects, capturing the state of an details, shortcuts, sharp tempo and attraction montage. The unembellished, “real” world without eliminating subjective film Army Artistic Theater provides a link between the prewar expression (of the protagonists and filmmakers). Light sources and post-1948 creative debates. are either visible on-screen or their placement is apparent from the spatial configuration of the fiction world, which supports The mostly exterior film Desire represents a return to another logical structure of the story and the required mental and tradition, the legacy of the Czech cinematography school and physical atmosphere. By working with this type of light quality, lyrical expression. Lenses with a long focal distance capture Kučera, in a way, applies his collector’s sensibility. While a typically Czech hilly landscape, with the composition being standard professional lighting, especially spot lighting, depends dominated by a high horizon and dramatic sky. The lighting is on a set of technical skills and on being familiar with lighting largely temporal and accentuates the temporal location of the conventions, naturalist light requires the additional experience narrative, while, at the same time, its Neo-Baroque aesthetics in observation, a collection of views, which then makes it make the landscape more monumental. What makes these easier to make a copy look like the original, or a specific images so emotionally compelling is the specific type of light atmosphere– like its representation. It is precisely in this type referred to as antisolar by Henri Alekan.34 Instead of direct of moving image that we see the previous studium of natural sunlight with a clearly localized light source in the sky is light resurface, as well as all of the principles of reflection and dominated by Baroque clouds, the light source is placed below light flow, contrasts and anomalies caused by different, atypical the horizon, adding a puzzling unrealness to the real world of surfaces. 33 Cf. Henri Alekan, Des lumières et des ombres forms. Landscape painting resembling Impressionist works, (Of Lights And Shadows). Citation from a partial as well as art by Antonín Slavíček, Otakar Nejedlý, Václav With this modern type of lighting that stands apart from translation in: Marek Loskot, Koncepce světla diffuse daylight and artificial light associated with photography v knize Henriho Alekana O světlech a stínech. B.A. Rabas, as well as traditional idyllic paintings by Mikoláš thesis, FF MU Brno 2009. Aleš and Josef Mánes make up a very strong visual strand in and painting, and with postmodern expressive artificial light, Kučera’s work, especially in films made with director Vojtěch Kučera enters another era featuring color as his chief device. 34 Henri Alekan, Des lumières et des ombres. Paris: Jasný. The Socialist approach to landscape which stresses the This stage in the development of his cinematography moves Editions du Collectionneur 1997, pp. 107–111. need for landscape cultivation is reflected in the fact that the away from the boundaries defined by the space before the film 35 Henri Alekan, Des lumières et des ombres. Cita- mythical or archetypal landscape is always represented by and inside the film, and starts relating to the space of the film tion from a partial translation in: Marek Loskot, a civilized landscape. itself, to the film stock and its possible modifications and alter- Koncepce světla v knize Henriho Alekana O světlech ations in the post-production stage, i.e., in the laboratory. Yet, a stínech. B.A. thesis, FF MU Brno 2009, p. 30. This tension between the authenticity and stylization of lighting (additional) lighting was not to play a minor part – it would aid 36 Henri Alekan, Des lumières et des ombres. Cita- and camera is manifested in other Kučera’s films, too. In its legibility to genre films, contribute to the breakdown of the tion from a partial translation in: Marek Loskot, I Survived My Own Death, the story of a boxer in a concentra- fiction world in experimental films, and become an important Koncepce světla v knize Henriho Alekana O světlech tion camp, light is presented in the full range of its possibilities tool in working with the film material. a stínech. B.A. thesis, FF MU Brno 2009, p. 33. and, along with the selected slant and camera movement, it 37 Henri Alekan, Des lumières et des ombres. Cita- is the most important component of the image and the story, tion from a partial translation in: Marek Loskot, serving as a means of refining the atmosphere. Lighting is Koncepce světla v knize Henriho Alekana O světlech applied in its “natural” form; diffused light that relies on the a stínech. B.A. thesis, FF MU Brno 2009, p. 31. 354 38 Organizační řád Filmového studia Barrandov. Progressive Tendency as Part for eight screens accompanied by stereophonic sound; Karel Praha, October 1957. of the Official Agenda Zeman’s The Fabulous World of Jules Verne /Vynález zkázy/, 39 Petr Szczepanik, Průmyslové autorství a skupi- a film based on special effects and animation; and František nový styl v českém filmu 50. a 60. let. Iluminace Although the 1950s were aggressively ideological, marked by Tröster’s kinetic scenography with pulsating neon tube lights Vol. 26, 2014, Issue 2, pp. 14–15. restrictions, unified norms, and political rhetoric, they also and cinemascopic screening of fire, uranium, and water became the basis for a diversity which started sprouting out included in the energy section.44 The exhibit was designed to 40 -a, Kamera nejsou jen hezké obrázky. Rozprávění s kameramanem Josefem Střechou. Rudé právo of this reductiveness. The 1950s can be considered a trans- demonstrate that Czechoslovakia was a home to truly free and 1969 (5. 6.), p. 5. formational period, and not just in the political and social progressive art and, regardless of the actual state of things, sense of the word. Following Khrushchev’s speech criticizing to ultimately confirm the right course of socialist culture. As 41 For more on the establishment of TV-specific Stalin’s cult of personality, there was a partial loosening which a result, Socialist Realism that rejected art for art and author- forms, see: Martin Ledvinka, Televizní oratorium brought about a gradual decentralization of the Czechoslovak driven individualism, opened itself up to experimentation that Genesis. Audio-vizuální analýza v kontextu české televizní opery. Thesis, Dept. of Musicology, Praha, State Film, a liberalization in filmmaking, and a major technical had up till then been filled with strongly ideological content, 2013. Jakub Jiřiště, Televizní drama v českoslo- change that can be seen as a broader social process including yet it was ready for different applications in the years to follow, venském odborném diskursu 50. a 60. let. Thesis, equipment production, artists who saw their basic tools literally in a period that would abandon clear-cut schematism. At the Film Studies Dept., FFUK, Praha, 2015. changing before their eyes, and end users who had to adapt to end of the 1950s, this experiment was still perceived as one of new approaches and forms. many possibilities in socialist-realist, progressive, engaged and 42 Although experimentation was more often found in amateur film after WWII, in 1948 it was included revolutionary art. Defined by many restrictions, this period set in the official plans for postwar cinema, namely At the end of the 1950s, new company regulations were off unique social changes which peaked in the 1960s and that in the production plans for short films. The goal introduced at the Barrandov Studios that gave more power allowed Kučera to carry out his original creative ideas. of experimental films was to look for and test out to studio producers over directors who, up until then, had new methods, subjects, and forms. However, these enjoyed a dominant position. Studio producers now decided plans were not really implemented and in the 1950s, all issues related to the script, production and finances within The 1960s as a Period of Collective Search film experiment found its home at FAMU, in animat- the studio production group, and were responsible for selecting ed and commercial film, and at Laterna Magika. See the seven key crew members: the director, editor, production In the early 1960s it became apparent that, due to the diversity also, Lucie Česálková, Atomy věčnosti. Český krátký manager, cinematographer, production designer, sound designer, and transformation of social atmosphere, the regime could no film 30.–50. let. Praha: NFA 2014, pp. 329–371. and make-up artist.38 In a way, the position of director and longer set the normative course and would have to settle for 43 The defense of progressive art tied with cameraman became more equal as the two crafts often worked a regulatory role. On the one hand, this served to uncover the experimentation drew on inter-war leftist in tandem, accompanied by the other film professionals. partial powerlessness of the totalitarian system, on the other Avant-garde, yet this line was partly interrupted A new institutional infrastructure was being established for hand, the total and totalitarian45 mindset had so permeated by the war and then by the postwar shift towards experiment-free socialist realism; moreover, cinematographers, both in education and later in the practice the entire society that it led to a general corrosion of social, a later definition of this type of art was divorced of filmmaking, and a joint platform was formed to exchange political and cultural life. Boundaries between official and from its original (utopian) ideals. experiences and promote shared interests.39 “Camera” was unofficial culture were gradually erased, conflicts abounded seen as a more “artistic”, “natural”, “real” and “professional” and the second half of the 1960s was already marked by 44 Cf. Bruselský sen. Československá účast na pursuit.40 Importantly, regular television broadcasting was liberalization.46 The Czech “underground” literary theorist and světové výstavě EXPO 58 v Bruselu a životní styl 1. poloviny 60. let. Praha: Arbor vitae 2008. launched around that time, which increased the demand for surrealist Vratislav Effenberger described the shift with a great cameramen, set up different modes for the craft, and generated amount of caution and skepticism: “The system now sustained 45 After the mid-1950s, I see “totalitarian” operat- debates on the “proper” form of television image and its itself like a piece of mold on decomposing matter and execu- ing mainly at a metaphorical level – as a modernist functions.41 This was a time of budding live TV, color film, tions were no longer deemed necessary for its sustenance”.47 concept leaning towards the whole, totality, magnetic sound, smaller camera equipment. There were lively construction, but also power, dictating the only possible truth and perspective. At the same time, discussions on how to make film more attractive for audiences In 1962, these changes resulted in a shift in the Barran- I do not discount its sociopolitical meaning. Cf. and on new screening possibilities – with the introduction of dov’s structure towards radical decentralization.48 Production Josef Vojvodík, Kultura a totalita. Mezi utopií, wide-angle, stereoscopic and panoramic formats – and also teams were able to get more autonomy and started devel- terorem a fantaziemi sebezničení. In: Ivan Klimeš – on the increasing the quality and quantity of films, which oping their own film ideas while applying an author-driven Jan Wiendl (eds.), Kultura a totalita I. Národ. Praha: opened up a space for the new “Generation 57” which included approach.49 These changes then allowed the introduction FF UK 2013, pp. 24–50. Jaroslav Kučera among its members. The introduction of these of new themes, as well as a new film language. This period, 46 For more, see Petr Pithart, Osmašedesátý. new formats helped to strengthen the cinematographer’s posi- described by Effenberger as “rotting” or “festering”, Praha: Rozmluvy 1990. tion and elevate it above other film crafts. (commonly referred to as the period of political “relaxation”) gave birth to the “Czech New Wave”. This was a new 47 Vratislav Effenberger, Republiku a varlata. Praha: Torst 2012, p. 191. Despite the lasting influence of antiformalism, there were generation of young, “well trained” filmmakers who, under attempts to experiment with form (across art forms),42 the influence of the then favored, tolerated and gradually 48 Cf. e.g., Jan Lukeš, Diagnózy času. Český techniques, and technology which fully manifested at Expo 58 rediscovered theoretical concepts, foreign ideological and a slovenský poválečný film (1945–2012). Praha: in Brussels. In 1956, the Ministry of Education and Culture social unrest of the 1960s, tried to set themselves apart from Academia 2011, pp. 27–101. tasked the National Theater in Prague with plans for the the formally dull, rigidly ideological and politically manip- 49 Petr Szczepanik, „Machři“ a „diletanti“. Základní Czechoslovak Pavilion at Expo 58, organized under the slogan ulated art of the 1950s, from Socialist Realism, and to find jednotky filmové praxe v době reorganizací a poli- “A Balance Sheet for a More Human World”. In the architec- new expression and new interpretations of the world. These tických zvratů 1945 až 1962. In: Pavel Skopal (ed.), professionals found themselves in a unique position when “the ture competition, prizes were awarded to František Cubr, Josef Naplánovaná kinematografie. Český filmový průmysl Hrubý, and Zdeněk Pokorný, while Jindřich Santar was the market dictate has not yet started working, and the power 1945 až 1960. Praha: Academia 2012, pp. 56–58, 64–66. Petr Szczepanik, Průmyslové autorství a sk- head scriptwriter for the event. The pavilion was supposed to dictate no longer worked”.50 Even though Petr Pithart claims upinový styl v českém filmu 50. a 60. let. Iluminace present, as broadly as possible, One Day in Czechoslovakia. It that the young filmmakers started being independent and Vol. 26, 2014, Issue 2, pp. 5–39. was designed to showcase selected areas of agriculture, arts and were able to delve into true experimentation,51 one must keep culture, as well as connections between them, as part of “the in mind that these filmmakers were raised in the reductive 50 For more, see Pithart, Osmašedesátý. Praha: country’s boom under the leadership of the Communist Party.” totalitarian regime, in a period of socialist deformations52 – at Rozmluvy 1990. Under the banner of progressiveness, the exhibit also incorpo- FAMU under the supervision by Otakar Vávra – which did not 51 Petr Pithart, Osmašedesátý. Praha: Rozmluvy rated experimentation with form and medium that would have have first-hand experience of capitalism, but had institutional 1990, p. 43. (otherwise) been hard to do in the official culture of Socialist backing, state funding and official support because its 52 For more, see Zdeněk Štábla, K poválečnému Realism.43 The Brussels World’s Fair premiered a number of “creative and moral charge resonated with the reviving social vývoji v kinematografii. In: Filmový sborník his- remarkable works: Laterna Magika directed by Alfréd Radok process and found in it a germane and inspiring environment torický 4. Česká a slovenská kinematografie 60. let. and stage designer Josef Svoboda, an original combination of and impulse for thought and creative work”.53 Zdeněk Štábla Praha: Národní filmový archiv 1993, p. 13–20. several cinematic (front and rear) projections, theater, dance, describes the young generation as one that “understood 53 Hovoří dramaturgové. Film a doba Vol. 14, 1968, song, music and pantomime; Prague Spring, a polyecran by socialism as liberation of man from oppression, social poverty, Issue 1, p. 8. Emil Radok, Josef Svoboda and Jan F. Fischer, a projection exploitation and other forms of humiliation and indignity. 355 They saw artistic pursuit as an act of self-expression and the with the use of ambiguous functions of color or with the image perspective of socialist society as a means of allowing for that “bleeding” beyond the frame.59 self-expression in culture and other fields.”54 They insisted on freedom with a greater vehemence than the previous Another shift took place in lighting, which had, up until generation. It was characteristic of the young generation and then, been a significant, meaning-making device. The film its position between the official and censored culture that they image – which in the 1950s had invariably involved precise and were not “hostile but strictly critical”55 towards socialism; meticulously planned lighting compositions, frequent contrasts, they were mostly critical to minor everyday problems with the artificial lighting, and that rejected all incidental elements – goal of uncovering life’s “truth”. Filmmakers also believed that opened up to chance completely in the 1960s, and yet lighting socialist society and non-capitalist cinema would allow them was no longer the main concern. According to Henri Alekan, to pursue truly creative work, and “liberate creative work”.56 light in1960s cinema is “light in its raw state, devoid of all psychological function except for the one performed by Kučera himself admitted in an interview at the time that he chance”. The importance of light itself was superseded by had (unfulfilled) hopes for contemporary cinema and hoped reflection and tonal quality of walls or costumes. Rather than that the time of typified film production would soon be over working with contrast and creating shadows, lighting favored and that films would start being “made” again in full creative diffuse light and deliberately acknowledged grey tones in the freedom.57 This kind of hopeful thinking usually emerges in (most often) East German film stock NP7, which were typical times of political and social upheaval and institutional restruc- for the early 1960s and infused the Czech New Wave with turing – for example, one can see a similar process at play in a clearly recognizable, atmospheric quality.60 cinema during the third republic. Although it was undeniably creative work, we must take into account that the step in a new As the previously constrained form opened itself up, direction was in line with the “new course” set by official young filmmakers were drawn to experimentation, one of culture. On the one hand – and following the official shift from Kučera’s key media practices. Kučera’s experimentation ideologically tainted historical films with high production value touched on all stages of production and post-production, 54 Zdeněk Štábla, K poválečnému vývoji v kine- to contemporary topics, modern approach and new talents – including film stock, lenses, equipment, chemical processes, and matografii. In: Filmový sborník historický 4: Česká filmmakers tried to capture everyday reality “in a more realistic copying. Kučera also tried out various special effects involving a slovenská kinematografie 60. let. Praha: Národní way”, and to capture people in their natural environments as camera and shutter speed, frame rate, frame-by-frame capture, filmový archiv 1993, p. 17. opposed to staged film adaptations.58 On the other hand – in image deformation and blur, mattes, as well as other effects 55 Zdeněk Štábla, K poválečnému vývoji v kine- keeping with the officially-favored “visual style” and “film done in the laboratory. One cannot claim that experiment matografii. In: Filmový sborník historický 4: Česká appeal” – they also tried to put greater faith in the power of as such represented an author’s autonomous gesture which a slovenská kinematografie 60. let. Praha: Národní images, tested the limits of the film medium, and attempted worked against the official style. On the contrary, it had filmový archiv 1993, p. 18. to find a new mode of expression and style. Using formal a very ambivalent role at the time. It followed the official 56 Antonín J. Liehm, Věra Chytilová. In: Antonín experimentation and strong stylization, they moved away from rhetoric of the late 1950s which confirmed the previously J. Liehm, Ostře sledované filmy. Československá realism and towards irreality, amimesis, and non-perspective. mentioned success of the Expo 58 Czechoslovak Pavilion and zkušenost. Praha: NFA 2001, p. 269. While the New Wave filmmakers leaned towards psychol- accepted Laterna Magika not just as a piece in an international ogizing drama (Evald Schorm, Juraj Herz, and others) and exhibit but as a part of Czechoslovak theater that should find 57 ftn, Jaroslav Kučera je slavný. Filmové a televizní too-often amusing or awkward images of everyday life (Miloš a permanent space.61 “Experiment” also denoted a politically noviny Vol. 2, 1968, Issue 1, p. 3. Forman, Ivan Passer), they also focused on the possibilities of motivated test, complete with official scrutiny, and was often 58 Naše anketa. Jak pracují tvůrčí skupiny. Tvůrčí the film medium itself and on accenting the form, which would seen as a scientific tool that would secure ideal life and suitable skupina Šmída–Kabelík. Film a doba Vol. 3, 1957, contrast with the 1950s realism (Věra Chytilová, Jan Němec, leisure time for regular Czechoslovaks. Unlike innovative Issue 3, pp. 152–154. Pavel Juráček, Ester Krumbachová and others). experimentation which comes with uncertain results, this type 59 Cf. Zdena Škapová, Cesty k moderní filmové of experiment aimed to find unification, averages, and its own poetice. In: Stanislava Přádná – Zdena Škapová In the search for new forms, filmmakers drew on reality, preservation and revision of the socialist system and its culture. – Jiří Cieslar (eds.), Démanty všednosti. Český inspired by trends in international cinema (especially contem- These experiments took place not only in culture (in many a slovenský film 60. let: Kapitoly o nové vlně. Praha: poraneous Soviet filmmakers and the French New Wave), fine ways, Socialist Realism can also be seen as an experiment) Pražská scéna 2002, pp. 90–94. art, and the booming wave of experimentation across different but also in politics, economics, and urbanism.62 In cinema, 60 Cameramen working as part of “new waves” in media. Alternatively, they often returned to the past, to their this meant “an artistic experiment that could be achieved only Western Europe mostly used Kodak film stock that own roots – an approach at the time suppressed and labeled as in nationalized film industry and that was not governed by had a higher silver content, higher contrast, and outdated – and tried to reinvent some of prewar Avant-garde a constant search for new shapes and different forms but by more saturated colors. practices (the Soviet Avant-garde was particularly influential). the effort to find an ideal norm and model that would show 61 In 1958, the Brussels exhibit was brought to Both these approaches were very closely tied together with “the right path for our entire film industry”.63 A cinematog- Czechoslovakia and in that same year, opened filmmaking and both helped to erase the constraints set by rapher who is inquisitive and disciplined has perhaps a more at the Sevastopol movie theater. A year later, standardized studio production or totalizing norms, as well problematic attitude to the (officially promoted) experiment Laterna Magika was established as the National as to find a new aesthetic and voice. This repurposing, along than any other film professional. Indeed, experimentation is Theater’s Research Stage, and its Experimental with a mix of various influences, technical advances, cultural important not only as a process but as a result which must Film Studio was founded, which focused on the and lifestyle changes, and political revisions (which launched be established so that it can be repeated and, thus, generate development of cinematic elements in the scenic design of individual performances. In 1960, the critique of Socialist Realism) led some filmmakers to experi- new cinematography norms or conventions. This then leads so-called 2nd tour program was performed using ment on multiple levels and to move across different artistic to limited research and, as a result, a cinematography work a mobile stage. Since the mid-1970s, Laterna and cultural contexts, or expressions of the everyday. On the is deemed successful if it employs a proven set of formal and Magika has had a permanent stage. level of filmic devices and narrative structure, one can see technical devices and methods. Films following this approach 62 Attempts to find idealized housing may be a shift away from linear and causal structure, as well as from have no other ambition and they fulfill the official demand for another good example. For more, see Ladislav traditional protagonists, coherent film systems, and unified a safe and reliable result. They also create a balanced image Zikmund-Lender, Experimentální sídliště Inva- gradation. There was also a lot of genre modification, stylistic that supports a traditional narrative, especially in popular lidovna. Hradec Králové – Praha: Zikmund Hradec innovation, and a constant search for new stylistic methods, genres, and enhances the given atmosphere. In Kučera’s work, Králové – Národní památkový ústav 2014. Markéta distinctive modes of subjectivity and authenticity. Cinema- this type of experimentation is apparent in comedies and Žáčková, „Byl sice jistý plán...“. Výzkumný ústav tographers freshly captured the subject in a broader context television programs made in the 1970s. Yet, owing to his inner výstavby a architektury (VÚVA) a experimentální (using depth of field, lenses with a greater focal length for desire for deeper experimentation, Kučera tended to cross even bytová výstavba přelomu padesátých a šedesátých shooting subjects from a distance in their natural environment) the painstakingly approved and promoted conventions, in order let dvacátého století. Sešit pro umění, teorii and included more information in a single shot. The image to keep trying devices not yet tested or proven, both at the a příbuzné zóny Vol. 7, 2014, Issue 17, pp. 20–49. alternates between being authentic and expressive, two modes level of material and compositional. In the 1960s, this mode of 63 Jiří Hrbas, Za těsnější spolupráci filmových of disrupting the illusiveness of the fiction world which fit in experiment was more prevalent than the former. Kučera was tvůrců. Film a doba Vol. 5, 1959, Issue 7, p. 453. 356 able to focus on a relatively continuous exploration in order to Kučera’s work with color composition was conceptual; for test out a variety of hypotheses on image qualities. That is why each film, he tried to find a specific set of formal devices and his work around this time was, perhaps, the most compelling color scheme (substantial collaboration with costume designers and his methods were the most visible. was essential during this stage – Ester Krumbachová and Irena Greifová were his long-term, creatively like-minded collabora- Experimental, progressive art also included, paradoxically, tors). For Kučera, color always carried qualities significant to a return to the past, to the principles and methods of home- meaning, symbolic power, and subconscious emotional impact. grown and international Avant-garde artists. As elsewhere, Color always had to correspond to the subject of the work and the possibilities of this kind of anachronism were hotly its structure and, ideally, add to its quality and aesthetic value. debated. On the one hand, there were calls for maintaining Based on the theme of the film, he opted for an Avant-garde, continuity with the Avant-garde concept, as supported by the (non)normative, or (un)normal path which would either reject surrealists Vratislav Effenberger and Zbyněk Havlíček, or the natural colors of the actual world, or stress natural colors and/ author Václav Havel; on the other hand, others like the art or particular hues, harmonies and contrasts. Color composition theorist Jindřich Chalupecký wanted to cut out any continuity was not to be self-serving, formalist, exhibitionist or affected. and start anew, which would in fact be in keeping with the Avant-garde spirit. Contradictory positions also meant Yet Kučera saw color even in the black-and-white material opposing views on contemporary art that wanted to reinvent in which color is reduced to tones of grey. He considered the Avant-garde. While Effenberger was rather skeptical to black-and-white films an (extremely) stylized variety of color these efforts which he saw as empty imitation, Chalupecký film that is always aesthetic and aesthetized, which linked viewed them in a positive light, as a possibility to implement him to other filmmakers who experienced the technical and Avant-garde utopian ideas.64 A practitioner by nature, Kučera technological changes brought about by the adoption of did not adopt either of these positions and did not join in color. Kučera’s work with the aesthetic of black-and-white these debates. His (moving) images contain a mix of all of stylization and absence of color can be seen in, for example, these views, referencing both the relationship to experiment Jan Němec’s Diamonds of the Night in which two young men and formal methods of the historical Avant-garde, including escape from a train on its way to a concentration camp. The collage, assemblage, the grid, geometry and abstraction, film blends two narrative lines – events of the escape are mixed synthesis and mixed media, intentional materiality, as well as with the protagonists’ memories and visions. Each narrative surreal/Surrealist subjects. He also drew inspiration from the level is defined by a very different visual concept. In the first Avant-garde and international experimental cinema, citing, for one, we have realist, almost documentary sequences with high instance, the influence of the American visual artist Ed Emsh- contrast, reaching specific plasticity of raw image. Prevalence of willer and his home experiments with the 16mm film. He also dark areas evokes the danger and high stakes of the situation. acknowledged tradition and respected authorial intent. Thanks to the blending of various influences, we can follow the ways At the dream level, the strong contrasts and sharp outlines in which Kučera deploys the use of interlocking opposites in dissipate due to overexposure that highlights light areas, his work – (non)linearity, (im)mobility (notable in Křik and which reduces the tension of the drama and evokes the feeling Dita Saxová), (non)spatiality and (a)temporality (apparent of warmth, albeit a warmth that is almost hallucinatory. By in All My Compatriots). All of these blending approaches, erasing the clear lines and disrupting the three-dimensional overlapping discourses and radical experimentation are appar- illusion, Kučera achieves an effect similar to many of his ent in the test copies and films made in collaboration with photographs – the objects lose their relevance, reality and its director Věra Chytilová, namely Daisies and Fruit of Paradise. traces start vanishing and the image becomes an interplay of It is especially these films that draw on the tension between geometric structures with minimal differences. Shots of dilap- current loans and collective codes, between the singularity and idated buildings and crumbling walls, elements often found in uniqueness of film innovations. Both films use the Avant-garde Kučera’s photography, contribute to a sense of disintegrating collage technique and reinvent the aesthetic of decay also reality. Both in the individual images and the overall visual found in Kučera’s photography. They also capture destruction concept of Diamonds of the Night, black areas alternate with of the world, fragments being put together in a new wholes white ones, while grey hues are reduced. The black-and-white and broken down into fragments again – these are fragments stylization resembles Kučera’s later experiments with structural, we see in Kučera’s home archive, random fragments and material film – multiple counterpoints, sharp alternation accidental collections with no historical bearings. between the two narrative levels, contrasts inside individual scenes and images bring to mind “flicker effects” and underscore the hallucinatory effect. 64 In the international context, these contradic- Color and Its Absence tory views were represented by Peter Bürger In contrast to black-and-white film, stylizing color film to and Hal Foster. Petr Bürger, Teorie Avantgardy. Stárnutí moderny. Stati o výtvarném umění In the 1960s, Kučera established his relationship to color, come across as more real and realistic is much more difficult (Theory of the the Avant-Garde). Praha: AVU 2015. which enriched his experimentation with tonality. Finding and must be conceptual; if a cinematographer wants to create Hal Foster, Co je nového na neoavantgardě (What’s the right approach to color constituted the main task for the meaning, he must resort to “alterations and selection.”67 Neo about the Neo-Avant-Garde?). Sešit pro 1960s generation of filmmakers65 and the issue became vital Kučera drew on the techniques for the stylization of black- umění, teorii a příbuzné zóny Vol. 4, 2010, Issue 8, for Kučera, both in his work and in teaching his students. He and-white material, and translated them to the color film in pp. 59–84. Cf. Marie Langrová – Josef Vojvodík – was known for his refined sense of color and for his flawless all stages of production, which helped him to discover new Anja Tippnerová – Josef Hrdlička, Symboly oblud- knowledge of color tones. The artistic quality of Kučera’s films special effects solutions. One of the most cited examples of ností. Mýty, jazyk a tabu české postavantgardy and his remarkable use of the color spectrum were based on Kučera’s work, the filmic allegory The Cassandra Cat is built 40.–60. let. Praha: Malvern 2009. his observation of color in reality and its representation in on the symbolic meanings of color – using magic glasses, 65 Also confirmed by Vittorio Storaro in the doc- fine arts. He would analyze color during his frequent visits residents of a small town appear to others in various colors that umentary film about his work, Writing with Light to art galleries, thinking about its impact and significance. reveal their true nature. Rather than being a supplementary (d. David Thompson 1992). He also set out to translate these relationships into images effect to enhance the atmosphere, colors in this film carry the 66 Johannes Itten, Kunst der Farbe (The Elements of without color being a mere imitation, trying to express his main storyline. Color). Ravensburg: Otto Maier 1961. Karel Hanuš, chromatic experience through the film medium and to animate O barvě. Optická stránka barevnosti ve výtvarnictví. static colors. Kučera was also well-versed in various theories In order to achieve the desired effect of monochromatic color- Praha: SPN 1969. involving colors, their physical properties, and perception – for ing, Kučera experimented especially prior to production and 67 ftn, Jaroslav Kučera je slavný. Filmové a televizní instance, theories put forward by Johannes Itten, Paul Klee and even during the shoot. He utilized color lighting along with noviny Vol. 2, 1968, Issue 1, p. 3. Karel Hanuš.66 the color stylization of the mise-en-scène, specific pigments 357 and special costume fabrics. This technique resembled color The central part of the film, a metaphorical take on a detective photography experiments that were popular at the time – as story, undergoes a striking shift in the color concept, and conducted by, among others, Kučera’s colleague Ján Šmok, its stylization is based not on post-production but on the the Olomouc-based photographer Jaroslav Vávra, and Eva composition of the mise-en-scène and its cinematographic Fuková. Lighting objects using color lamps or direct projection representation. Color no longer serves as one of the basic imbued images with modern feel and pop art brightness.68 building blocks for a distinctive film language but instead, to For The Cassandra Cat, it was more important to stage create distance from what is being depicted and from its repre- a formal confrontation of reality and fiction/projection which sentation. Instead, it serves to strengthen the basic narrative, would fully fit in with the central theme and help to uncover the meanings of the images and the film’s atmosphere. Colors what would otherwise be invisible and unseen nature of the have a crucial dramatic function – the color hues of objects protagonists, compare them with their self-image, with the and costumes are carried through the entire film (especially the others and with lived reality. contrasting red and green, and the neutral black and white), get transferred from the actors to the relationship between Stylization in The Cassandra Cat was limited due to the state objects and protagonists and vice versa, possess a symbolic of technology and its simple, allegorical storyline. Some of value, and as the tension builds up, their shades get darker as Kučera’s later films had a greater range of possibilities for well. In contrast to the sharp colors – red, especially – there color, which conditioned the development of ideas about are almost colorless landscapes with, or even without a high their use and about the potential of basic conflict between horizon, warm hues, and complementary colors – red contrasts reality and fiction. The most notable formal shift of the color with green we find in the garden. The color camouflage from spectrum compared to its standard layout can be seen in the the prologue subsides and gives way to sharper contrasts (“the extremely formalist and stylized Daisies. The main concept truth” comes to the foreground), yet the composition still concurred with the film’s theme. The film captures all stages emphasizes surface and the flatness of images. While Daisies of the transfer to color material; there are black-and-white creates its own reality, Fruit of Paradise displays tension shots and their color hue variants, color reduction methods, between its connection to reality and its disconnection. laboratory special effects using color extracts and mattes, images containing the full, or even extreme, color scheme. While chromaticity in his later films is not as intense, Kučera Shifts in plot and atmosphere also change the levels of nevertheless deployed color as one of the key tools of “coloring” present in individual cinematic images and their expression. He still maintained that, like in painting, a color colors, absence of color and monochromaticity, while the film should focus on using relationships between colors, at individual color accents and hues within and in between scenes least two tones, because meaning cannot be carried by just maintain an organic whole. The focus on color or the lack one color.71 Color was an important device for Kučera, mainly thereof is not just another instance of self-reflection that is an serving to characterize the protagonists, environment, genre integral part of the modern cinematic expression, but it also and atmosphere, and to supply symbolic meaning. A typical opens up dialogue with the history of color use in cinema. Any example for this kind of functional use of color is the color connections to actual history are abandoned and replaced with palette employed in All My Compatriots, which reflects the a general level of symbols and metaphors. season of the year in which the plot is set. The use of color harmonies enhances the idyllic landscape and the harmonizing While Kučera’s other images maintain some ties to reality, in effect of nature, but also expresses its inexorability, regardless Daisies these are completely lost. Thanks to its color style, the of the political and social context. Kučera simplified the color film often goes beyond the script and creates an entirely new scheme in his films across various genres, selecting several reality, a new world. In this case, his experiments with color basic colors based on the nature of the scenes, atmosphere are not merely a question of finding the right unifying key and and central meanings. Colors of the costumes corresponded aesthetic order, but also involve a moment of estrangement with basic landscape accents, and utilized contrasts within the within the visual code. The dissonance that was widespread overall composition. For instance, in Dogs and People, Kučera in society permeated the form and allowed for the rejection of repeated four colors (complementary purple and yellow, neutral the mimetic and representational codes: colors are no longer black and white) to strengthen the naivist nature of the stories dependent on objects and reality but can carry their own and to tie them together. In Little Mermaid, Kučera used the meanings; objects change colors and depart from their real contrast of warm and cold colors to capture the differences form. This departure from reality is enhanced by the lighting between the regular and the marine world; in Dinner for method that minimizes shadows and by the composition Adele, colors also characterized different environments and that resembles decorative ornament (not just the basis of the captured the atmosphere of Art-Nouveau Prague; in A Night “puppet-like” nature of the film, it requires movement of at Karlštejn, a unified color scheme and carefully selected images as in a kaleidoscope).69 color accents added to the clarity of the fairytale world. The media technique of color experimentation remained crucial for The next stage in the use of color, narrative composition and Kučera and he continued to explore it in his later films, Laterna multiplication came with the film Fruit of Paradise. Věra Magika performances, television programs, personal projects, Chytilová commented on the basic difference between the and in his teaching career. 68 In the global context, these methods that also chromaticity of the two films made with Jaroslav Kučera: “Our incorporated the projection of images on the pho- previous film Daisies was shot in color but it still felt to us like tographed object or figure, or taking photographs it didn’t have enough color. We don’t want color to be merely Normality and Normativity: using colored filters, which have become part of commercial photography – as represented by, descriptive, we want it to get inside”.70 In order to understand Fringes of the Center among others, Brian Duffy –, psychedelic and nude the construction of the fiction world, the viewer is forced to photography. view these internal changes in color as an organic creative Strict regulation dominated the 1960s and experimentation device. Like in Daisies, the prologue (and partly the epilogue) was used to find a different perspective and reach the everyday 69 One of the test copies also shows the figuration of Fruit of Paradise represents the destruction of relationship through the different and the extreme. In the 1970s and multiplying and changing in the dynamic image, as the figures vanish and become abstract between reality and its image – mattes and overlapping images 1980s, however, it was no longer sufficient that the norm ornaments. create a peculiar camouflage, areas of color become separate, would be merely integrated in the “rotting” system. The overlap and take on completely different hues – “the truth” norm was now declarative, enforced and controlled to such 70 Vojtěch Měšťan, Ovoce stromů rajských jíme. vanishes and emerges, only to remain concealed again and extent that it became part of the label used for this period, Záběr Vol. 2, 1969, Issue 14, p. 3. replaced by myth. Color in this film possesses a compelling i.e., “Normalization”. Unlike the left-wing Avant-garde and 71 ftn, Jaroslav Kučera je slavný. Filmové a televizní artistic quality, while the storyline itself is not relevant. Socialist Realism, this period dealt neither with ideological noviny Vol. 2, 1968, Issue 1, p. 3. 358 principles and cultural-political agenda, nor with struggle New Wave once again had the opportunity to make films with against an external enemy (the capitalist world). It completely a decent budget, and often revisited old film projects that had lacked any ideological core and was seen as clear, legible and been put off due to lack of support. Directors associated with consciously restrictive, it clearly focused on the present (defined Normalization films lost some of their exclusive position in the itself against the sins of the past decade) and it was supposed system and their films were fair game for criticism. From 1986 to work mainly from the inside. This form of ideology without to 1989, “Perestroika” opened up a space for art associations, ideas was possible because there was no natural form of more open debates in the press, and theatrical releases for some ideology and all ideals had been revealed as utopian by 1968, of the previously banned films.78 There was a number of new as Vratislav Effenberger noted: “[…] not because anyone with critical and unconventional films, some even employing the a capable mind, if found out, would immediately be ostracized Avant-garde poetics of Prague’s fringe theater. Although this as a potential threat, but simply because it is no longer worth was a period of political relaxation, some of the changes and the effort”.72 shifts that took hold around this time in fact started in the previous period, and some of these changes were so profound The very term “Normalization” emerged shortly after the that there was no way back. occupation in August 1968, following the “lessons” learned from the preceding crisis that had been accompanied by Between the 1960s and the 1970s, there was a major political, “consolidation”, and it denotes a process that aimed to social and cultural shift. Jaroslav Kučera correctly predicted “normalize conditions”, “restore order”, reclaim Communist its consequences as early as in the fall 1967, in an interview dominance, crush any opposition, and establish a permanent with A. J. Liehm: “I’m afraid that all cultural continuity might state of the present.73 The term is commonly used to describe be severed. A lot of people have lost their jobs. […] But losing 72 Vratislav Effenberger, Republiku a varlata. the two decades leading up to 1989, although it labeled only continuity would be the worst thing that could happen”.79 Praha: Torst 2012, p. 197. the beginning of the power restoration efforts. Kučera’s search To a certain extent, the circumstances were similar to those for a new film language was abruptly interrupted, too. It was faced by the 1950s generation of filmmakers as they had to 73 Cf. Daniel Vojtěch, Válka za časů advokáta a long, monotonous period of commissioned jobs, professional face the arrival of Socialist Realism. This period was also Bucefala. In: Ivan Klimeš – Jan Wiendl (eds.), responsibilities, and occasional sidesteps. According to marked by a rift in continuity and filmmakers ran into a dead Kultura a totalita II. Válka. Praha: FF UK 2014, p. 21. Daniel Vojtěch demonstrates that the social Jaromír Blažejovský, one can classify Normalization cinema end. Yet, as Ladislav Helge writes, the crisis did not follow situation in the 1970s Czechoslovakia was formed in five successive stages.74 The first one, “Consolidation” logically from the absence of creative impetus and inspiration, by a three-slogan doctrine: lesson, consolida- (1969–1971), was marked by political purges and structural instead it stemmed from external causes and from the political tion, normalization, marked by, according to changes in the Czechoslovak film industry. With creative situation.80 As opposed to other art forms, this break in Vojtěch, “a remarkable temporal structure of the teams dissolved, the new model of so-called script editing and continuity was inevitably much more harmful in cinema owing present.” production teams was introduced, which led to the splitting to its media, material, and technical demands. When painters, 74 Jaromír Blažejovský, Normalizační film. Cinepur of the script and production departments and resulted in writers or musicians decided to keep working despite being Vol. 11, 2002, Issue 21, pp. 8–9. Petr Kopal (ed), more careful control over each project.75 Films whose subject targeted and harassed, they could have done so in the fringes or Film a dějiny 4. Normalizace. Praha: Casablanca – matter and aesthetic seemed to have an affinity for the Czech through samizdat. And though this kind of creative endeavor ÚSTR 2014. For more on institutional history, see New Wave, were labeled as unsuitable and were in most cases is certainly not acceptable, the nature of the film industry also Štěpán Hulík, Kinematografie zapomnění. banned, i.e., they did not get a theatrical release date (e.g., would have made it completely impossible. Movies could not Počátky normalizace ve Filmovém studiu Barrandov The Ear /Ucho/, Larks on a String /Skřivánci na niti/, and have been made without the necessary equipment, material, (1968–1973). Praha: Academia 2012. Srov. Jan Birds, Orphans and Fools /Vtáčkovia, siroty a blázni/) or were and laboratories, and had to be created within the official Lukeš, Diagnózy času. Český a slovenský poválečný outright eliminated from the film distribution chain (e.g., All infrastructure. In all of its components, film was severely film (1945–2012). Praha: Slovart 2013. Petr A. Bílek – Blanka Činátlová (eds.), Tesilová kavalerie. My Compatriots). Although Kučera and Chytilová were at the affected by any changes in the structure of the industry, in Popkulturní obrazy normalizace. Příbram: Pistori- time still finishing Fruit of Paradise, a Belgian co-production, the system of repressions, aesthetic standards and censorship. us & Olšanská 2010. Paulina Bren, The Greengrocer it was very clear that bold and unconventional films would Filmmakers of the “crisis period” associated with the New and His TV. The Culture of Communism after the be extremely difficult to make going forward. The radical cut Wave were no longer allowed to make auteur cinema and 1968 Prague Spring. New York: Cornell University did only impact only a particular art form or medium but was had to settle for facile commissions in order to display their Press 2010. felt across the cultural and intellectual landscape that had loyalty to the system and to secure more work. Those who had 75 Štěpán Hulík, Kinematografie zapomnění. mutual shared influences and inspiration. This atmosphere rejected or had never received this option, were either forced to Počátky normalizace ve Filmovém studiu Barrandov of fear, ongoing waves of emigration and various restrictions seek refuge abroad or wait for several years until a new set of (1968–1973). Praha: Academia 2012, p. 146. and bans, was very destructive. The period concluded with the changes in the system allowed them to make films again.81 As 76 Poučení z krizového vývoje ve straně a společnos- passing of the party document The Lessons from the Crisis in Barrandov Studio employees, film directors would be appointed ti po XIII. sjezdu KSČ. <http://web.quick.cz/pr/histo- the Party and Society after the 13th Czechoslovak Communist to individual films by the head of the creative team without ry/pouceni.htm> [Accessed 17 November 2015]. Party Congress, which set up many regulations for the years to any concern for their interests or creative potential so that follow.76 the already broken continuity was deliberately negated. Even 77 Jaromír Blažejovský, Normalizační film. Cinepur so, some creative collaborations and professional ties were Vol. 11, 2002, Issue 21, p. 8. The period of so-called “Normalization on the Offensive” maintained and these still contributed to a somewhat distinctive 78 Jaromír Blažejovský, Normalizační film. Cinepur (1972–1977), according to Blažejovský, already adopted the style. With the arrival of normalization, Kučera’s work was Vol. 11, 2002, Issue 21, p. 9. subject to various restrictions, yet it was not banned. new social order and the newly-established cultural patterns 79 Antonín J. Liehm, Jaroslav Kučera. In: Antonín and codes, with ideological function prevailing over aesthetic J. Liehm, Ostře sledované filmy. Československá function, and as “[t]he perspective of the party agenda came Just as experimentation combines two different meanings, zkušenost. Praha: NFA 2001, p. 276. to dominate, impulses from the 1960s gradually died out and searching and testing, normalization blends both normality 80 Antonín J. Liehm, Ladislav Helge. In: Antonín the imperative of Socialist Realism saw the return of Stalinist and normativity. Normality is related to the everyday and, J. Liehm, Ostře sledované filmy: Československá aesthetics”.77 Instead of following their own natural devel- according to Jürgen Link, since it is based on statistical data, zkušenost. Praha: NFA 2001, p. 276. opment, form and style were stunted and any elements that it is established on the basis of specific behavior and patterns. 81 Štěpán Hulík, Kinematografie zapomnění. deviated from realism and mimesis were elimnated. Norm(ality) is hence the average value of activities that Počátky normalizace ve Filmovém studiu Barrandov have taken place, it is the average value derived from data (1968–1973). Praha: Academia 2012, p. 221. From 1977 to 1982, it was the period of “Resurrection” measured.82 Norm(ativity) is formed in the opposite order – it as the ideological pressure on cinema partially eased. Some exists apriori and serves to standardize, regulate and restrict 82 Jürgen Link, Crisis between „Denormalization“ filmmakers, such as Věra Chytilová, were allowed to work behavior. Clearly, political processes are constituted from the and the „New Normal“. Reflections on the Theory of Normalism Today. Conference Lecture: Norms, again and several socially critical films were made during this latter sense of the term, yet in cinema, both are combined into Normality and Normalization: DAAD Postgraduate time. The next stage of Normalization (1983-1987) is described a single whole. Technical foundations of filmmaking always Summer School, The University of Nottingham, by Blažejovský as the period of “The Decline of Normalization require both of these components so that the image is “visible” 2.–6. 7. 2013. Film”. A number of filmmakers associated with the Czech but during normalization both content and form were also 359 included in this process. Normativity was determined by the media and their material components (plus technological and Czechoslovak Communist Party when it announced that, “the technical elements). One can never travel light, as traveling is party and the socialist state must control all means that would always loaded with ideology and theory/theories. It is affected allow it to enforce its political, class and ideological goals. by historical, intellectual and epistemological demands, as well Media, press, radio, television and film are an immensely as the political and social situation, and conditions for their important tool of power and mass political education that acceptance or rejection.90 should never elude control by the Marxist-Leninist party and the socialist state, or else socialist cause may be under A similar process can be applied to the arts and media serious threat.”83 In addition to the normative, ideologically practices which are also conceptual in nature – traveling is also driven films that followed this declaration, other films were applicable in this case, yet during Normalization it was often made as well, without politically charged ideas,– regular, easy forced. The main impulse for this movement and changes in genre films related to the everyday and to consumerism.84 context shaping the final media/material was the political and Due to the shift of the film form towards unification and social situation. Traveling, translation, and transfer occurred at mediocrity, possibilities for creative cinematographic work multiple levels which correspond to the traveling of theoretical were considerably diminished and the creative gesture became concept. Jaroslav Kučera traveled back and forth between mostly a craft, as the cinematographer’s role of an assistant national cultures, across the borders of Czechoslovakia, across helmsman was reduced to that of a servant, and the image time, i.e., revisiting Avant-garde methods, but also back to became “remarkably sterile”,85 secondary to the script and various historical periods in popular films. Equally important, the story which would ideally be simple, entertaining, and Kučera made regular forays into television with which he unchallenging. Experiment in art could no longer be used to collaborated from the late 1960s; in the 1970s his commis- search for the “truth” and to test the untested, and it was only sioned work for television doubled. Kučera’s traveling between connected with the ideal standard that could be repeated and his public and personal projects was less visible and photogra- standardized. phy remained a constant pursuit. In the 1980s there were other crucial excursions, to another art form at Laterna Magika, and This period was typical for the blending of normalization and to theater and dance in his collaboration with Petr Weigl. “normality”, standardization and banality that were the result of a constant struggle for power, economic disintegration, Kučera’s first professional journeys/commissions following citizens trained to exist in a permanently passive and dazed his forced break were mostly genre films set in the present, state of mind, “mainly through soccer, ice hockey, television, such as the comedies Joachim, Put Him into the Machine! and cars, weekend homes and DIY,” and the illusion of a prob- Hurly-Burly in a Circus, the drama Death of Fly, and films lem-free oasis of peace.86 In fact, the Communist propaganda aestheticized not in the form but in the mise-en-scène, with was recalibrated and switched from the boundless activist joy costumes and make-up, e.g., the historical musical A Night at of Socialist Realism to popular culture. Karlštejn, the fairy tale Little Mermaid, the comedy Dinner 83 Poučení z krizového vývoje ve straně a společnos- for Adele, and the mystery drama Morgiana. As opposed ti po XIII. sjezdu KSČ. <http://web.quick.cz/pr/histo- The party tried to boost consumerism, not only as a possibility to the radical stylization in his previous work, these movies ry/pouceni.htm> [Accessed 17 November 2015]. of achieving profit, but as a trade-off for the public’s accep- required the use of simpler, illustrative film devices for a simple tance – reluctant or not – of the official party line. Petr A. Bílek storyline and, to a certain extent, style became largely invisible. 84 Jakub Machek, Normalizace a populární kultura. Od domácího umění k Ženě za pultem. aptly suggests that there was “a stronger selection of products These official commissions went against Kučera’s previous In: Petr A. Bílek – Blanka Činátlová (eds.), Tesilová that made its way straight to one’s home and were designed to experiments and approaches yet it was not possible to get rid kavalérie. Popkulturní obrazy normalizace. be passively absorbed with the warm and cozy feeling of great of all of his “baggage” – his specific visual style. In the making Příbram: Pistorius & Olšanská 2010, p. 10. entertainment”.87 As one of the forms of entertainment and of Normalization, or his “normal” films, he displayed not only potential oases, cinema was also forced to turn to seemingly his talent but a great degree of professional craftsmanship, and 85 As Věra Chytilová said in an interview with Miroslav Gábor for his thesis. Miroslav Gábor, non-political, ideologically neutral works, escapist and typified he set a higher quality standard for genre films made during Jaroslav Kučera, Kameramanská osobnost. genre movies, especially comedies and detective films, and the same period. Always focusing on the topic and trying to M. A. thesis, FAMU 1992, p. 48. low-brow fare. Cinema joined in the period’s penchant for find its essence, Kučera usually adapted formal devices to rules entertainment, which was able to conceal anything that could of the given genre – the camera “told” the story, enhanced the 86 Vratislav Effenberger, Republiku a varlata. Praha: Torst 2012, p. 197. be problematic and dogmatic, and it often suffered from protagonists, the environment, and the period atmosphere. The “worthlessness, spiritual insignificance, stereotype of flexible lighting was close to the (neo)classical style or “re-theatricaliza- 87 Petr A. Bílek, K práci i oddechu. Znakový systém beliefs and bland craftsmanship”.88 tion”91 and its main goal was to emphasize the storyline and to normalizační pop music. In: Petr A. Bílek – Blanka create intense and clearly legible images. Spatial compositions Činátlová (eds.), Tesilová kavalérie. Popkulturní were as carefully planned as those in his stylized films; in his obrazy normalizace. Příbram: Pistorius & Olšanská 2010, p. 62. Media Transfers and Excursions to use of color, Kučera continued to follow the rule of several the Center and to the Fringes Jan Lukeš, Pád, vzestup a nejistota. Iluminace 88 dominant color tones. Despite the typified content, themes and motifs, the result was not just a sum of conventions and routine Vol. 9, 1997, Issue 1, p. 65. Kučera’s work underwent internal changes, both based on the but a compact, artistically and aesthetically impressive whole. 89 Mieke Bal, Travelling Concepts in the Humanities. development of cinema and his own style and on the official A Rough Guide. Toronto: University of Toronto normative demands, conditions and contexts. At the same Throughout these years, Kučera continued to experiment Press 2002. Birgit Neumann – Angar Nünning time, his work saw many forced transfers, shifts, displacements with film material, shooting methods, postmodern collages, (eds.), Travelling Concepts for the Study of Culture. and dislocations, not just in the literal but in the structural laboratory, and optical special effects. Oddly enough, he was Berlin – Boston: De Gruyter 2012. and stylistic sense – forms, structures, and constructions able to fully test out these experiments in another medium, 90 Edward Said, Travelling Theory. In: Edward Said: changed and were then adapted and transformed. If we explore while making vocal recital TV shows, A Novel about a Rose The World, the Text, and the Critic. Cambridge, MA: “traveling concepts” as coined by Mieke Bal and as used in with singer Zdena Lorencová, Vacation and Hidden Water Harvard University Press 1983, pp. 226–227. other ways in cultural studies,89 we can see the basic problems Springs with singer Hana Zagorová, which were designed to 91 Henri Alekan, Des lumières et des ombres. Cita- of this multiple shift much more clearly. Bal uses traveling evoke the carefree and joyful energy of Normalization life.92 tion from a partial translation in: Marek Loskot, concepts as operative terms of a performative nature that Popular (and often banal) songs ideally matched the efforts Koncepce světla v knize Henriho Alekana O světlech are metaphorical meta-language that helps to create contact to convey ideological messages through popular genres. Set in a stínech. B.A. thesis, FF MU Brno 2009, p. 13. zones between individual disciplines. What follows is a mutual a private space, these programs were at once a peculiar zone 92 Petr A. Bílek, K práci i oddechu. Znakový systém dialogue and comparison, a two-way enrichment of internal in between a strictly limited format and a free space for formal normalizační pop music. In: Petr A. Bílek – Blanka conceptual structures and their modifications, and then they experimentation. For each song, Kučera selected – according to Činátlová (eds.), Tesilová kavalérie. Popkulturní go back into their native disciplinary framework again. This the required diversity of the program – a different atmosphere obrazy normalizace. Příbram: Pistorius & Olšanská process of traveling takes place thanks to “vehicles”, i.e., and devices, but he also worked with special effects, polarizers 2010, p. 67. 360 and diffusion filters, slow motion, (extreme) canted angles, and genre modes. These steps can be understood as a search for photographic mosaics. Although individual shots concur with “strange places”, i.e., spaces which can form in times of Kučera’s creative methods and reveal experimental sensibility, oppression and become a specific creative, artistic, and cultural the overall context turns their impact on its head. The conven- refuge. Under “normal” conditions, an artist might not even tional and cheery pop song format, banal lyrics, the display look for these places. Often they are a paradoxical hub where of a completely happy and untroubled life in a socialist state, official culture meets unofficial and banned culture, where different rhythms and functions strip these techniques of any the forbidden is permitted, restrictions are softened, and the aesthetic qualities and convert them to empty embellishment. official may carry unintended connotations (for instance, in This type of program would be tacked on to period comedies, a free country, notable actors would hardly meet in a small seemingly straightforward images of popular culture designed apartment in order to be able to stage a classical play). These for “a content socialist individual” which can “generate easily are not non-places – empty spaces devoid of tradition – but digestible and lasting images” that promote and reflect official rather spaces in which various traditions co-exist and overlap, ideology and help to “maintain general balance and stability of spaces oversaturated with “strange” meanings that might not the new social order”.93 be readily visible. Excursions to these places required adapta- tion and flexibility, i.e., even authorial style had to adapt to After his considerably frustrating forced break, Kučera started different conditions. Compared to his previous films which creating “Avant-garde” sequences and scenes for normalization had drawn heavily on photography and painting techniques, genre films. In terms of form, these could become the basis for Kučera’s films from this period were much more tied to experimental films, yet they were placed in an entirely different a specific visual performativity, and many of them represented context and, as a result, became more of an embellishment that a synthesis of his work. announced their own ornamental purpose. It was a glittery surface with no depth. These sequences popped up in very Media transfer, dislocation, and the beginnings of performa- specific spaces in each film, literally on its edges, i.e., in the tivity were best displayed in films he made for the multimedia opening credits. Credits are an opening section of the film theater Laterna Magika, which Kučera made mainly in the stock that carries information, located in between diegesis early 1980s and which allowed him to once again expand and non-diegesis. They prepare the audience for a cinematic his visually epic concept of the moving image (e.g. in Black experience, transport them into the film’s space and story, and Monk, Pragensia, Vox Clamantis, Odysseus).96 Laterna evoke the atmosphere and emotions of the fictive world.94 Magika, a specific synthesis of stage acting, ballet, pantomime, Kučera’s credits at times resist the storyline and genre, which and cinema, has been one of these “strange places” since the are usually backed up by typography that leans more towards 1970s, a refuge visited by progressive artists who were unable pop culture and function. As an extreme example, Hurly-Burly to fully focus on their original art form or who were banned in a Circus was one of Oldřich Lipský’s normalization comedies from pursuing creative work (e.g., directors Alfréd Radok and set in the circus environment, exploring Czech-Soviet part- Evald Schorm, musician Michael Kocáb, artists Eva and Jan nership and shot in one of Moscow’s major circus buildings. Švankmajer). Paradoxically, though these artists were officially It contains very unconventional credit sequences and the banned from pursuing their art, they were allowed to work at credits test copy looks more like an experimental film with the Laterna Magika and to create projects that represented socialist aesthetic quality of video art. The abstract bodies of acrobats Czechoslovakia and maintained its progressive credentials, as geometric shapes are copied into multiple color (using were exported abroad and advertised to tourists. mostly color reduction) or black-and-white layers in an abstract interplay of shapes, figuration is replaced by ornamentation, Cinematography, as applied in theater and in technically chal- and the realistic depiction of a circus show that is central to lenging multimedia projects, requires similar changes to those the storyline and the form is turned into the complete opposite. required during the shift from still photography to cinema. Action stills that would be more suitable for an art gallery are Cinematographers become part of a differently-organized team. used as the background of a typography that evokes a family In the film industry, they are responsible for the overall visual comedy, and accompanied by a score that perfectly matches the concept – film relies on visual storytelling and images are the acrobatics and the entire circus setting. chief vehicle for meaning and atmosphere – yet at Laterna Magika, they take a back seat. Cinematographers shoot Transfers and dislocations during this period – so critical images that are merely fragments in the overall audiovisual for Kučera’s future career – took place largely at the level of composition; their final form depends on the number, size and structure and style and within the film space, especially in its shape of the projection screens and their placement in the stage 93 Petr A. Bílek, K práci i oddechu. Znakový systém fringes. In the period that followed, Kučera embarked on truly design. At the same time, the moving image has its own specific normalizační pop music. In: Petr A. Bílek – Blanka spatial transfers; he certainly did not travel light and brought role. The space of Laterna Magika presents at once showing Činátlová (eds.), Tesilová kavalérie. Popkulturní all the “baggage” of his practices, perspectives and experience. and telling, performative and narrative art, poetic and prosaic obrazy normalizace. Příbram: Pistorius & Olšanská elements, atmospheric and dramatic sets. 2010, p. 58. 94 For more see Jan-Christopher Horak, Saul Bass. Strange Places in Socialist Culture Although film is not the only or the key component, as one of Anatomy of Film Design. Kentucky: The University the multitrack and most eclectic art forms,97 it allows for the Press of Kentucky 2014. In the 1980s, the strictest period of Normalization was creation of a specific structure for all of these encounters. It is 95 Ivan M. Jirous, O české undergroundové coming to an end and it was once again possible to partially one of the means of adaptation or a tool to facilitate intermedia kultuře 70. a 80. let. In: Martin Machovec (ed.), resume creative endeavors and engage in non-conforming transfer. If it shifts towards just one element of representation, Pohledy zevnitř. Česká undergroundová kultura ve films, social critique or formal experiments; yet, Ivan Martin it would be just a backdrop of the performance. Ideally, specific svědectvích, dokumentech a interpretacích. Praha: Jirous still labeled this period as “the quagmirest”.95 Kučera film devices and active work with the image allow to blend Pistorius & Olšanská 2008, p. 79. carried on shooting genre films – both for theatrical release different times and spaces, strengthen the overall synthesis and 96 As also attested by Jan Kališ in an interview and for television (This Will All Be Over Tonight, Christening, amplify its emotional impact. with Miroslav Gábor for a thesis. Miroslav Gábor, Extra Time /Prodloužený čas/, Wilder Westen, inclusive) but Jaroslav Kučera. Kameramanská osobnost. M. A. he also went back to his creative work, although this time Special effects were often used to elevate the experimental thesis, FAMU 1992, p. 48. in very different positions compared to his focus prior 1968 mode of Laterna Magika performances, e.g., split screen, poly- 97 As termed by Robert Stam. Robert Stam, Beyond (Black Monk, Odysseus, Die Nacht aus Blei, A Village Romeo ecran, multiple exposure, image and color dissolves, changing Fidelity. The Dialogics of Adaptation. In: James and Juliet, etc.). The difference was due to a second level of color and abstraction, reverse and deformed motion. These Naremore (ed.), Film Adaptation. New Brunswick: relocation, this time to the theater environment and fine arts, methods helped to link individual modes, genres, art forms, and Rutgers University Press 2000, p. 61. beyond the borders of socialist Czechoslovakia and to different staging approaches. Laterna Magika allowed Kučera to pursue 361 a new kind of experimentation and to test out special effects, environment. It is more difficult when transferring an opera, something which was not possible in his genre commissions. or music accompanied by a specific, un-cinematic figuration He was able to partly resume his media practices from the late and gestures. Even adaptation theorists approach this issue in 1960s that sought to find new formal devices. He employed various ways. Some theorists, such as Siegfried Kracauer, reject kinetic, abstract (e.g., shots of a water surface in different the connection of these (essentially) different media,98 others light conditions and using different filters, a macro-detail of like Theodore Adorno point out the various historical and an eye) and experimental areas (geometric shapes and color aesthetic similarities between the two, yet others, such as Linda patterns), but also previously used special effects, e.g., additive Hutcheon, maintain a neutral stance, and merely comment color mixing and delayed projection of monochromatic images on and outline individual possibilities.99 One major issue in so that the shadows of the dancers had sharp multicolored terms of image space is the disparate approach these media outlines. He was able to continue searching for new kinds of have towards naturalism and artificiality. They also treat the expression that would not serve just to propel the narrative. narrative differently. Although opera can be labeled as a perfor- mative art, both forms tell (words, libretto) and show (image, Despite the great degree of precision that drove its performance figuration, movement). Yet film is closer to being a novel, machine, Laterna Magika operated with a certain amount of while opera has more in common with poetry. At the level of chance and with the infinite substitution of individual images. showing, film restricts performativity and expressiveness, while The basic principle was a constant change of images as well as opera does the exact opposite. Furthermore, time is treated the function of individual features. Like in the collage Daisies differently in the two art forms. Opera as gestic poetry is able and the palimpsest Fruit of Paradise, reality was suppressed to stop time (especially in arias100) without diminishing its in these performances. Being in the artificial world of the emotional impact. Film, on the other hand, relies on temporal multimedia, in “a strange place”, allowed reality to be (re) reduction that does not correspond to theatrical tempo, and discovered; the performance tied reality to the inner experience television speeds this up even more. of the world (evoked by associations), to passing (gaze) along the surface (due to image fragmentation), going beyond Linda Hutcheon describes the ways in which film tackles opera, one’s own experience (immersive images that allow “being” and outlines the possibilities available for this kind of media in the image), and searching for various planes of reality transfer. One of them involves suppressing cinematic naturalism (overlapping and falling apart). For a totalitarian society, the in favor of the artificial theatrical world. The self-reflexivity of breakdown of the seeming wholeness is as significant as the film and non-cinematic devices can be combined with stylized rupture in reality and authenticity that led to the creation of acting and the theatricality of the props. Another possibility an alternative world that transformed the original, and whose is, according to Hutcheon, suppressing the contrived nature open structure invited the viewer to enter its inner (free) of the opera world and putting more emphasis on cinematic psychoplastic labyrinth. That is why these performances could realism. Opera in film is then tied only with the diegetic be so compelling in times of lost faith and misery, face to face world, it appears only when the operatic gesture is expressly with reality. As “a strange place” and also as an institution represented and does not constitute unnatural disruption of “hiding” progressive artists and hampering their creative work the film fiction. In addition to these two categories, Hutcheon via state commissions, Laterna Magika also preserved the outlined a third one, the hybrid form of opera film or opera on 1960s media technique of experimentation. Historical memory the big screen in which realist film conventions help to translate was replaced by creative and experimental memory so strong, it the un-realist art that is theater.101 Opera adaptations shot has endured to this day. by Kučera did not abandon theatrical stylization. They either acknowledged the principle of artificiality (Die Nacht aus Blei) This period in Kučera’s career was significant because of or were labeled as the hybrid form (I consider A Village Romeo another excursion to “a strange place”, a space involving and Juliet, shot mostly in the exterior, the purest form of film different media and located outside Czechoslovakia. Kučera opera). started shooting TV adaptations with director Petr Weigl, made in German-British co-production (Die Nacht aus Blei, Issues concerning adaptation and its internal contradictions Maria Stuarda, Die Reise nach Prag, A Village Romeo and were resolved by Weigl and Kučera102 by using the moving Juliet). These were creative adaptations of various works image and its composition which became a new possibility which required translating the source work into a different for transfer. This certainly returns to the original definition set of conventions. These moving images are fascinating for of theater (theatrum) as a place for the display of all that was their complex transformation that challenges everything – in worth seeing.103 The key of the adaptation was not derived terms of the source, there is tension between narration, music from language-based theater but from theater as an art of and dance; in terms of the art form, there is tension between showing. Intermedia translation is based on extralinguistic literature, opera, dance, fine arts (always a major source of expression – music or dance as the chief vehicles of meaning 98 Siegfried Kracauer, Opera on the Screen. Film inspiration) and film; and in terms of media practices, tension in opera. Rhythm, aesthetic quality of the image, chromaticity, Culture Vol. 1, 1955, pp. 19–21. exists between storytelling, showing, performing and painting. diffusion filters and composition are crucial in these films, and 99 Linda Hutcheon, A Theory of Adaptation. all of these elements are influenced by Kučera’s cinematography London – New York: Routledge 2006. Like with Laterna Magika performances, it was necessary to experience, his techniques for musical representation as applied adapt the techniques and tools, and to find a specific recoding in the vocal recital TV shows and music videos, as well as his 100 Siegfried Kracauer, Opera on the Screen. that would be suitable not for the centrifugal space of the knowledge of fine arts. This is best seen in the unruly images Film Culture Vol. 1, 1955, pp. 19–21. theater, but rather, for the centripetal film/television frame. of Die Nacht aus Blei which are reminiscent of Surrealist 101 Linda Hutcheon, Co se děje při adaptaci Looking for a new approach and maintaining a certain essence painters, such as Paul Delvaux and René Magritte, and which (What? /Forms/). Iluminace Vol. 22, 2010, Issue 1, of the original inevitably complicates the process of translating especially resemble Surrealist and metaphysical paintings pp. 34–36. one art form into another. Kučera had ample experience by Giorgio de Chirico. Chirico was noted for his reduced 102 Apparently in a close collaboration, similar to with literary adaptations (Morgiana, Little Mermaid, Zlateh chromaticity and for artificial, staged spaces with unnatural his collaboration with Věra Chytilová and Vojtěch the Goat) that involved transfer between a language-based figuration that evoke the impossible. The alteration of planes Jasný. narrative and a narrative (and showing) combining verbal of color and particular choppy motion is reminiscent of the 103 Cf. Erika Fischer-Lichte, Za estetiku performa- and image devices. Adaptation methods are already specified expressionist painter Lyonel Feininger. According to Petr Weigl, tivna (The Transformative Power of Performance. in the script, and for the cinematographer it is not much several superhumanist painters also provided inspiration that A New Aesthetics). In: Kateřina Krtilová – Kateřina different from shooting an original script – importantly, they enhanced the project’s mystery, tension, provocation and Svatoňová (eds.), Medienwisschenschaft. Výcho- must find the image equivalent of subjective perspective, curiosity, namely Graham Ibbeson, Mike Francis, Ian English, diska a aktuální pozice německé filosofie a teorie the inner state of the protagonists, and description of the Nick Cudworth, Malcom Poynter, John Buckley, Eric Scott, médií. Praha: Academia 2016, p. 324. 362 and Barry Burman. The emphasis on the visual aspect in Die and the basic elements. The central section is captured using Nacht aus Blei also reflects the seriousness of its theme and – unusually for Kučera – fluid, slow horizontal dollies and the Kafka-esque atmosphere. The original novel is, in no way, close dollies which he had used in film operas – through empty a chronological narrative with a clear meaning, and it contains hallways and around the exterior walls. The camera is often many gaps and ruptures, hence it would be almost impossible positioned in a non-human high-angle or low-angle shot and to capture this kind of non-sense and dis-order verbally. Operas culminates in a fast vertical dolly. operate in a similar fashion as they have a sparse plot of (lyrical) poetry. In all of these films, language is marginalized, The set of film devices underscores mon-u-ment-ality and if at all present, and the main focus is on music, sound, image, evokes the etymology of the word. The roots mon- and ment- figuration, and silence. There is another type of stylization, are a double way to denote sense, meaning and mind, thinking, seemingly very different from that of Die Nacht aus Blei – the but also memory, remembering, and recalling. A forgotten hyperrealism of the everyday in A Village Romeo and Juliet. and broken image of the world becomes whole again after Opera arias performed in a forest, at a fair, or an industrial many years, and a memory print will return to the images setting ultimately do not document or acknowledge reality, but and photographs which had rejected their own history. The rather, theatricalize it. pathos of monumentality and accent on (national) history, tradition, and convention may be unusual for Kučera but it is In terms of dis-order, it was equally important to find not so surprising. With regard to the aesthetic ideas during the a specific “voice” for the moving image, and, creatively, it wartime period, Josef Vojvodík believes that it is precisely at drew on Avant-garde approaches, but this time, not on Dada times when humanity is being crushed by totalitarian systems and Poetism, but rather on Surrealism. According to Linda that this type of pathos and convention is emphasized as Hutcheon and William Jinks, it is precisely this deployment of a guarantee of European culture and its universality, humanity, Avant-garde and experimental devices that allows one to find and ecumenical solidarity.107 All of this is contained in these an equivalent to non-narrative methods,104 and becomes the images, shot at a time of devastation by a different kind of key to adaptation of the specific combination of music, tempo, totalitarian regime. and poetry that is opera. In addition to his usual filmic devices, (e.g., the color scheme corresponding to the atmosphere), Kučera approaches the topic of totalitarian power and dehu- Kučera newly used fluid and panoramic movement equivalent manization from a completely different angle in his next film, to the specific time set by the pulsating music that added an the short 16mm, mostly black-and-white 1984: Year of Orwell. extra temporal level to the opera compared to theater. The It was an unusual foray into the field of fine arts, made in 1983 combination of these two basic devices, i.e., color and (im) in collaboration with the painter and sculptor Jiří Sozanský. mobility then allows linking not just very challenging aspects Following a request from the architect Miroslav Masák, who of the artificial and the natural, but also passivity and activity, supervised restoration of the fire-ravaged Veletrzni Palac, affect and pathos, that are essential in opera and dance. The Sozanský started creating a performance based around the body tightly-connected poles of emotional impact are supported in the context of environmental projects that would take place by the typically pathos-filled themes of adaptations, such as in the gallery space, which would correspond with the 1980s “estrangement, love as an attempt at communication, trauma atmosphere (and with the then published samizdat edition and brutality, tragedy and ‘theater of the world’, passivity, of George Orwell’s 1984). “Standing in the middle of a busy paralysis and stillness in time and space […] or the theme of street, the burned building of the Veletrzni Palac was covered dehumanized and bankrupt (technological) civilization”.105 in plastic, lifeless, and seemed like a monstrous memento that in its own way matched the image of the period.”108 Instead of considering the usual plans for a “site-specific” perfor- Monument, Pathos and Breakdown: mance and the space as a sculpture, Sozanský thought of the A Final Synthesis dilapidated palace as a possible film prop. He started preparing a screenplay that involved the naked human body amidst art In the 1980s, Kučera embarked on two crucial “paths” objects, plaster castings, and paintings, accenting the naked 104 Linda Hutcheon, Co se děje při adaptaci (What? which partially revived older techniques and ideas about the physicality, brutality, the fight for survival, manipulation, /Forms/). Iluminace Vol. 22, 2010, Issue 1, pp. (moving) image, continued his dialog with the Avant-garde and workings of power, the hunt, and destruction – all of it in an 40–42. William Jinks, The Celluloid Literature. experimental approaches and, at the same time, constituted the oddly apocalyptic space, inside the skeleton of a building where Film in the Humanities. Los Angeles: Glencoe 1971, culmination of his work, or its elevation to another level. In the floors were covered with dust and pigeon droppings. The pp. 36–37. 1981, Kučera crossed beyond the “craftsman” cinematographer film was shot in collaboration with Evald Schorm, Jaroslav 105 Josef Vojvodík – Marie Langerová, Patos role and made his only author-driven film, the short documen- Kučera, Laterna Magika dancers Eva Černá and Karel Vaněk, v českém umění, poezii a umělecko-estetickém tary Prague Castle. While the modern city was the backdrop of and choreographer Marcela Benoniová. myšlení čtyřicátých let 20. století. Praha: Argo Kučera’s films from the 1960s, instead of observing its inner, 2014, pp. 13–14. everyday dynamic and modern features, Kučera’s documentary The image of the environment, events, and art objects is shown 106 In scenes that identify the Prague Castle assumes a traditional approach to create a monumental portrait in high contrast or in grey tones, always with clear grain and within the context of Prague’s architecture – of the city’s central monument. Rather than a snapshot, it is emphasis on the coarse and textured film material that becomes for example, shots of the Wenceslas Square and a meticulously composed pose. Kučera’s typical counterpoint a vehicle for another layer of meaning. The camera seems Old Town Square, which Kučera captured in his and other tension-building devices are still present – Prague to be touching the space and the shoot itself becomes one of photographs so many times. For more on film Castle is presented using contrasts of static establishing shots the central themes of the film. The film highlights its own practices deployed in Prague Castle, see also and slow dolly shots tracking the features and interiors of the experimental methods which went beyond Kučera’s experimen- Štěpán Kučera, Porovnání obrazové koncepce building, as well as still frame and internal motion within the tation up to that point. Slow choppy movements enhance the v hraném a dokumentárním filmu. M. A. thesis, image, colors of nature contrasted with the subdued facades, sense of arythmia and anxiety, or even the neurasthenia of the FAMU, 1995, pp. 24–25. atmospheric light in dramatic opposites, exteriors alternating environment, amplified by the repetition of shots, alternating 107 Josef Vojvodík – Marie Langerová, Patos with interiors, day with night, clear, contoured images captured black-and-white and color film, slow motion or sped up shots, v českém umění, poezii a umělecko-estetickém through special filters, the movement of light bringing to life unifying shots, and deliberate gaps. The static nature of the myšlení čtyřicátých let 20. století. Praha: Argo immobile form, and historical buildings depicted in relation to image is disrupted by the theatrical gestures of the dancers or, 2014, p. 18. new buildings.106 The Prague Castle is not made more monu- vice versa, the lifeless bodies and their plaster castings come 108 Jiří Sozanský, 1984. Rok Orwella. Praha: mental simply thanks to the regal music by Vladimír Petrov but to life within the irregular motion of the film. If we return to Symposion 1984, p. 11. also thanks to the film’s triadic structure. The beginning and Lyotard’s discussion of acinema, we can see this paradoxical 109 Jean-François Lyotard, Návrat a jiné eseje. ending are composed as mirror images and consist of a quick structure as immobilization of chronological time, a spasm that Praha: Herrmann & synové 2002, p. 105. sequence of static shots of the natural cycle, the four seasons constricts the chronotope of perception.109 (Im)mobility does 363 not just correspond to the film’s main theme but also to the Summary hopeless timelessness of the early 1980s which is acutely felt, yet the totalitarian power attempts to cover it up by passivity This monograph provides a systematic examination and minor everyday pleasures. Kučera uses other experimental of the recently discovered archive of the cinematographer Jaroslav Kučera who undeniably techniques as well – dissolves, soft focus, unconventional belongs among the most renowned Czech film framing or ellipsis, which adds to the sense of “breathlessness”, professionals of the second half of the twentieth again very typical for the period and theme in question; century. the figures vanish and reappear and the camera lends them He is known as a progressive cinematographer a certain kind of elusiveness, just like in Kučera’s photographs who defined the visual style of a number of Czech with their clear outlines of textures and structures vanishing films (e.g., Diamonds of the Night, Daisies, Fruit of Paradise, All My Compatriots and Dinner for Adele), into abstraction. Laterna Magika performances (e.g., Odysseus), and as the director of the documentary film The research footage shot by Jaroslav Kučera using his own Prague Castle. His body of work is still much more material and equipment, and entirely outside the official diverse and includes ideologically tainted films (e.g., Circus in the Circus), genre movies (e.g., film industry, crucially continues some of the original media Joachim, Put It in the Machine) and made-for-TV techniques, practices, and forms used in private home movies movies (e.g., What a Wedding, Uncle!). This so far as well as in films involving radical stylization and experimen- solitary study of the cinematographer has become tation. In a specific synthesis of the methods from the 1970s somewhat complicated with the discovery of Kučera’s extensive archive that contains images, and 1980s, and thanks to personal connections from “the photographs, negatives, transparencies, home strange place” of cultural exile, it is also the culmination of movies and unpublished dailies, test shots, as well Kučera’s work. This film can be seen as an accompaniment as other 16 mm and 35 mm footage. This material to his creative documentary Prague Castle. As opposed to the allows for a more comprehensive approach to Kučera’s perspective and his way of thinking monumentalization of the timeless national symbol against through images, and to investigate connections the backdrop of the changing seasons, emphasizing changeless between his personal photography and home values, the power of history and tradition, here we see topical videos and his professional film career. themes of destruction and decay of the symbol of modernity, its While exploring these new modes of Kučera’s vanishing underneath layers of dust, deformation of mankind, creative universe, this monograph also opens up absence of freedom in a totalitarian regime. The journey a variety of theoretical concerns. It examines the little researched perspective of a cinematographer comes full circle – as if Kučera stepped straight in the actual along with the basic media practices – collecting, center of his collection of views and shots, into the space of looking. In a more general way, it focuses on the crumbling real world for which he always tried to find – at the shifting nature of archives from modern to once inventively and rigorously – corresponding representation. postmodern times, professional aspects of amateur film, and different ways of experimentation with the space of an image and within the image. This study is the first step in examining theoretical issues surrounding cinematography. Moreover, it vividly outlines some of the attributes of creative and mainstream filmmaking in socialist Czechoslovakia. 364
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