Argument (Anthony McCall and Andrew Tyndall) April 24, 2006

Ocularis
at Galapagos Art Space

Argument
Anthony McCall and Andrew Tyndall, 1978, 84 min

"The twin principles of modernism and marketing: seeing fresh promise in familiar things."

Anthony McCall and Andrew Tyndall's legendary and provocative essay film Argument, first screened at the Edinburgh International Film Festival in 1978, has been almost unseen for the last twenty years. LUX has now made a new High Definition restoration of the film, and its trenchant analysis of media ideology seems more pertinent than ever.

Three male voices dissect one edition of the New York Times through a series of locked-off shots, revealing the prejudice and latent content of news and advertisements, reading images as texts and presenting text as an image. Fashion photographs are used as a starting point for a political investigation of news, advertising, and images of masculinity - while at the same time, the filmmakers reflect on their own position and the possibility of radical film practice. Influenced by both the America and European avant-gardes, notably Godard and Hollis Frampton, Argument is stylistically beautiful and relentless in its enquiry.

With an introduction by Anthony McCall.

THE ARGUMENT BOOK

?Typesetting is political: this has rarely been registered as acutely as in Anthony McCall and Andrew Tyndall?s Argument project. The decision here to reproduce the Argument book as a complete facsimile of the 1979 edition is partly a recognition that fonts are as historical as fashions (another of Argument?s preoccupations). Fashion and film, as McCall and Tyndall suggest, both make images to be read ? both are hieroglyphic. But written language is itself also an image. This makes the ethos, and pathos, of Argument?s fonts one of many underexplored connections between McCall and Tyndall?s project and the conceptual art of contemporaneous New York.? ? from the introduction to the new edition by Mike Sperlinger and Ian White

Alongside the restored version of the film, LUX is pleased to be republishing the book by Anthony McCall and Andrew Tyndall which was originally published alongside it, copies of which will be available for purchase at Ocularis.

As well as being a sustained investigation into the semiotics of newspapers and magazines, the Argument project turned the spotlight on the issues around making and screening "political" films. These ideas, which are present in the film, are developed further in the book, which includes three important essays by McCall and Tyndall: "Sixteen Working Statements," "Artist as Businessman" and "Against the Numbers Theory." The book also features images from the film, as well as responses and reviews of the original screenings by Jane Weinstock, David Himelfarb and Claire Pajaczkowska.

Ticket Price - $6

Official Website: http://www.ocularis.net/