Alchemy of the Word (Altered Video Version) 1987

Directed by Peter von Ziegesar

Twelve years after making the experimental black-and-white 16mm film, Alchemy of the Word, I ran the film through a prototype digital video synthesizer called a Chroma-Chron, and added a soundtrack by the East Village band, Liquid, Liquid and the German electronic music composer, Holgar Czukay. The result is a pulsing, meditational, almost tribal film containing lurid colors and dense, finger paint-like qualities. In a sense, the video is closer to what I’d intended when I made the original black-and-white film and follows the same Rimbaud-esque disordering of the senses.