Projection performances
Bruce McClure
USA 1994–present
Modified 16mm-projectors
In his performances McClure uses between one and four modified 16mm-projectors simultaneously. These are equipped with transformers that can vary the intensity of light from the projector lamps. Punched metal plate inserts inserted in the light path of the projector render the machine as a wounded animal accompanied by optical sound yelps and cries. The shapes cut out of the metal plates are also used to contrast with the conventional aspect ratio. Through each of these projectors runs a series of film loops, consisting of rhythmic patterns of emulsion and base that create a flicker-effect. Sometimes McClure “sneezes” India ink in an additive process that contrasts to the bleaching away emulsion. The ink sneeze is a reference to Fred Ott's legendary reflex provoked and captured by Thomas Edison's labratories in 1894.
“McClure processes his sound live by optical sound synthesis, in which the dark/light contrasts of the filmstrip, together with the countless splices and perforations, are made audible when they pass over the projector’s optical sound head. The individual loops are spliced with tape, and are then copied by print in the lab. The actual pattern of tape splices that hold the loop together, the printed tape splices and the pattern of switching from transparent to non-transparent leader, all make different sounds. These optically generated sounds are manipulated live by going through a series of distortion pedals and other basic analog sound equipment. The result is a machine-like, deafening Techno-Beat, which in combination with the optically layered filmstrips guarantees the spectator an intensely vivid sensory experience” (Jutz 2016: 417–418).
Bruce McClure, born in 1959 in Washington D.C., lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.
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Video
References
Gabriele Jutz, “Audio-Visual Aesthetics in Contemporary Experimental Film,” in The Oxford Handbook of Sound and Image in Western Art, ed. Yael Kaduri (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), pp. 397–425.
Bruce McClure, Interview with Brian Frye, http://www.brooklynrail.org/2006/07/film/bruce-mcclure-with-brian-frye.