Opus III

Lichtspiel: Opus III (1924) is composed from squares, rectangles and other straight-edged forms animated in overlapping, kinetic compositions. The shapes in this film are not solid colors, but graduated tones, and the development of each sequence is built around asymmetrical compositions that break the frame into harmonious sections. The result is dynamic, active: the moving shapes suggest the rapid movement of machinery, pistons. Then in the middle of the film there is a shift towards a bifurcation of the frame and oscillating patterns that rotate around this central axis, before a return to the asymmetry of the machine-like motions. The compositions employed in this film are unique in the 1920s, resembling the later work of Joseph Albers, or, the more contemporary work of Peter Halley in the 1980s.

Color serves a dramatic purpose in this film. Short sections of red and blue alternate towards the end, creating a contrast, but as in Opus II, the whole frame is tinted, and there is no hand-painting. The alternation of monochromatic, colored compositions at the conclusion enables the end to achieve a dramatic resolution that was missing in his earlier films. This use of color for emphasis is repeated in his last abstract film, Lichtspiel: Opus IIII (1925): the first half the film is black and white, then it is tinted blue for a minute-long sequence of curved forms filling the frame, oscillating on screen, after which the opening black and white forms reappear, superimposed with the curved forms, then finally, the last two shots are bright red. The organization and imagery in this final film has even fewer parallels in the abstract painting of the 1920s. Composed in several sections, the first is made from bands of white and black that stretch horizontally across the screen, and “roll” between being white bands on black and black bands on white. These are interrupted by an ascending white blocks that moves outwards from the center, but does not empty the screen. Instead, these vertical bars move horizontally across the bands, creating graphic compositions. The closest parallel in film is Lines Horizontal or Lines Vertical by Evelyn Lambart and Norman McLaren in the 1960s; however, the imagery of Opus IIII resembles nothing else so much as the abstract video works of the 1970s by Gary Hill and the Vasulkas produced at the Experimental TV Center. —cinegraphic.net