Description
Book SynopsisLouis Van Gasteren was one of the most prolific filmmakers in the history of the Netherlands, with a resume that includes nearly eighty documentaries and two feature films-to say nothing of artworks and books.
Filming for the Future offers an extended exploration of Van Gasteren's work and audio-visual world. Patricia Pisters introduces us to a filmmaker who always had his camera ready and was relentless in filming a wide range of topics and events of national and international importance. Fascinated by technology, deeply engaged with politics, and intensely occupied by the traumatic effects of war, Van Gasteren assembled an unparalleled record of life in twentieth-century Amsterdam and beyond.
Filming for the Future will be an invaluable source of documentation and analysis of one of the key filmmakers of our time.
The book is accompanied by 3 DVDs by 7 films by Van Gasteren:
A New Village on New Land (1960),
The House (1961),
A Matter of Level (1990),
The Price of Survival (2003),
Hans Life before Death (1983),
Changing Track (2009) and
Nema Aviona za Zagreb (2012).
Trade Review"Finally. An engaged and thoughtful full-on narrative illuminating the work of Holland's preeminent film director, Louis van Gasteren. Patricia Pisters's,
Filming For The Future is an unflinching and deft rendering of the six decades of van Gasteren's films; the writer giving blood, flesh and story to a complicated and controversial artist's obsessions and aesthetics. Like her subject's work, Pisters eschews cliche and slippery ideas to cement a well-wrought and hard earned research that throws bright light onto the times and temperament of van Gasteren's work. Filming For The Future, is an essential compliment to understanding van Gasteren's life, films and obsessions" -
Michael Martin, author of Extended Remark: Poems from a Moravian Parking Lot "Unique attempt to interpret the multifaceted en multilayered oeuvre of the Grand Old Man of Dutch documentary in all encompassing treatise. A great achievement!" -
Hans Beerekamp is a former film critic and current TV critic for the Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad "Pisters's work is outstanding, well written, academic and yet so accessible, a generous militant documentary-like portrait of an important figure of Dutch cinema that I just discovered. An essential contribution in Film Studies." -
Élie Castiel, Editor in Chief of SÉQUENCES - La revue de cinémaTable of ContentsIntroduction: Encountering a Prescient Filmmaker Louis van Gasteren 'an ebullient director bursting with ideas' Selecting from a vast non-linear spectrum THE OPERATION - BROWN GOLD - ACROSS THE SAHARA Chapter 1: Land, House, and City Housing and Architecture: Constructing and Rebuilding a Post-War Country ALL BIRDS HAVE NESTS - A NEW VILLAGE ON NEW LAND - BACK TO NAGELE The House: History, Memory and Meaning THE HOUSE Dwelling in the City Roots and Resistance ROOTS OF THE CITY (public art work) Chapter 2: Water, Transport, and Technology Water is Our Element: The Sea as Friend and Enemy THE STRANDING - MAYDAY Dry Feet Below Sea-Level: An Integral View on Water AOD (public monument) - A MATTER OF LEVEL - NEELTJE JANS (land art project) Technologies of Transportation: Roads, Phones and Globe-Conscious RAILPLAN 68 - GLOBE-CONSCIOUS MATERIAL PAINTINGS (art) - WARFFUM - THERE IS A PHONE CALL FOR YOU Chapter 3: War and Traumas of the Past MONTE KLAMOTT (art project) Mediated Memories of the Second World War Return of the Repressed: From KZ-Syndrome to PTSD NOW DO YOU GET IT WHY I AM CRYING? The Haunting Shadows of Ducker and Dorbeck A CHAINSAW FOR THE PAST - THE CLOUDY EXISTENCE OF LVG - HAMARTÍA Sorrows of a Past Never Lived ROERMOND'S SORROW - THE PRICE OF SURVIVAL Chapter 4: Young Rebels and Doors of Perception Generations, Existential Roles, and Circles of Life before Death HANS LIFE BEFORE DEATH Stirring Things Up and Psychedelic Escapes ALL REBELS Electronic Brains and Audio-Visual Investigation of Perception BECAUSE MY BIKE STOOD THERE - DO YOU GET IT 3, 4 - OUT OF MY SKULL - SUNNY IMPLO (art) Chapter 5: Europe, Politics and Multinationals Sardinia, Evolution of One of the Oldest 'Homes' of Humanity CORDEBBU, SALUDE E LIBERTADE, THE SARDONIC SMILE Sicco Mansholt and the Emergence and Evolution of the European Union CHANGING TACK Global Capital and Neo-Colonial Wars REPORT FROM BIAFRA - REPORT FROM KARTHOUM - MULTINATIONALS Coda: Feedback Loops in Time without Final Cut Joie de Vivre and Disillusions of Life NEMA AVIONA ZA ZAGREB Cutting and Re-Ordering, Temporal Looping and 'Nema' Filmography of Louis van Gasteren Art Works of Louis van Gasteren Illustrations Bibliography Index
