Iannis Xenakis

Filmes

The Eternal Colour of Interior
Music
Stuck in a never-ending cycle of routine whilst isolated within her home, a young woman enters a colour-soaked, phantasmagorical downward spiral.
Day
Music
An experimental short film shot on iPhone 7 Plus during the first year of the COVID-19 outbreak. The film depicts a young man's love for arts and his inability to coexist with his persona.
Tambores
Music
Present in nearly all cultures and used for many purposes, drums have unique shapes, sounds, names and accents in each region of the world. Behind this vast legacy are individuals who play them and are touched by these ancestral instruments. From the rare budimas used by Tonga people in Zambia to the large drums of the Chinese temples, from the religious festivals of Brazil to the rhythmic richness of the Arab World, these men and women keep this tradition alive.
Charisma X: Iannis Xenakis
Iannis Xenakis
This is a documentary film on the life and work of the composer Iannis Xenakis, the “architect of sound”, whose visionary work reconciles art with science. The film develops in such a way to show how Xenakis’ philosophy, architectural experience, mathematics and political background morph into music and how physical phenomena are transformed into musical expression.
OHM+ : The Early Gurus Of Electronic Music : 1948-1980
Himself
Over two hours of rare performances, interviews, animations, and experimental video. Milton Babbit's discussion of the difficulties of working with archaic synthesizers in the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center in the 1950s and 60s is a firm reminder of just how foreign electronic sounds were to even the academic community only 40 years ago. Likewise, Paul Lansky's private lesson with theremin inventor Leon Theremin is an example of how non-user friendly electronic musical instruments could be, even to people who should have the best sense of how to approach them.
Nadir
Documentário sobre o pintor Nadir Afonso.
Peefeeyatko
For the past ten years Zappa in composing has turned away from Rock and Roll music - for which he first became famous - and has been working on new, contemporary, orchestral electronic music; in solitude and beyond any commercial conventions or commitments. It is the first time that Zappa has allowed a film crew to study him during compositional work, actually filming the first moments of a new compositional process. By contrast, in a staged interview Zappa gives comments on music. This film seeks to reveal the sensetivities of Zappa's personality and character also beyond narrative content.
Something Rich and Strange: The Life and Music of Iannis Xenakis
Himself
BBC TV documentary
Olivier Messiaen and the Birds
"A renowned composer and organist, Olivier Messiaen was also a great teacher. Michel Fano, who took his composition class at the Paris Conservatory, films some of the privileged moments of his teaching. This film, co-directed with Denise Tual, also shows Messiaen as a devotee, an ornithologist, and a synaesthete, evoking the fundamental concepts of his inspiration with an often sparkling ease (the musician imitating certain bird songs in a manner reminiscent of Rouch recreating the cries of wizards for certain films). In this way, the film boldly collides sequences with visual or sound correspondences, the directors succeeding in dragging us into the world of mystery and dreams dear to the musician." (François Waledisch)
Celluloid and Marble
Self
Celluloid and Marble is based on Rohmer's own articles published in "Cahiers du cinéma", discussing film in relation to the other arts, maintaining that, in an age of cultural self-consciousness, cinema was “the last refuge of poetry” - the only contemporary art form from which metaphor could still spring naturally and spontaneously.
Fer chaud
Music
Purged from its details, the image thus obtained offers a vision of this sculpture reduced to moving lights.
Vasarely
Music
In 1960, Xenakis composed the music NEG-ALE for P. Kassovitz's "Vasarely", an abstract film on the artwork of Op-Art master Victor Vasarely.
Continu-discontinu
Music
Piotr Kamler meets Luc Ferrari & Iannis Xenakis. A play of opposites: space, colour, forms, movements
Electronic Poem
Production Design
Poème Électronique is an 8-minute piece of electronic music by composer Edgard Varèse, written for the Philips Pavilion at the 1958 Brussels World’s Fair. The Philips corporation commissioned Le Corbusier to design the pavilion, which was intended as a showcase of their engineering progress. The pavilion was shaped like a stomach, with a narrow entrance and exit on either side of a large central space. As the audience entered and exited the pavilion, the electronic composition Concret PH by Iannis Xenakis (who also acted as Le Corbusier's architectural assistant for the pavilion's design) was heard. Poème électronique was synchronized to a film of black and white photographs selected by Le Corbusier which touched on vague themes of human existence.