Future Directions for Experimental Studies: Databasing the Avant-Garde Filmmaker with Digital Tools

A Workshop Led by Ben Ogrodnik (University of Pittsburgh)

How do digital tools amplify, redefine, and destabilize the research questions and the data we commonly work with in the study of experimental film and art? How do broad issues of access, copyright, design, and technical expertise intervene on digital-born research projects? In this hands-on workshop, participants will address these questions and survey future directions for experimental studies. Participants are invited to test, play with and evaluate a handful of cutting-edge digital tools in a computer lab setting. Our toolset ranges from GIS-driven databases tracing the circulation of film and video in the 1970s-1980s (MIMC: Mapping the Independent Media Community); to institutional histories of film cooperatives in the UK (Film and Video Distribution Database); to visual timelines that archive the marketing and screening of avant-garde events (E.A.T. Datascape 1962-Today and the Andy Warhol Film Advertisement Collection). By the workshop’s end, participants will gain a working knowledge of technologies that enable new forms of discovery, and a critical awareness of the pitfalls and possibilities these tools open up.