Expanded Nature: Ecologies of Experimental Cinema

This book explores the emergence of ecological consciousness in the work of contemporary experimental filmmakers. If it can be said that experimental filmmakers are "expanding" the artistic field through an exploration of the potencies, modes of dissemination and performance of the moving image, in the Anthropocene these practices strive for another kind of expansion: to expand our experience of nature. Appending flowers to the film strip or burying it in the ground, inventing observational devices, allowing the camera to be affected by natural forces, engaging one's own filming body in a symbiotic relationship with the environment, reconstituting ecosystems at the moment of projection: the ecologies of experimental cinema presented in this book constitute forms of practice and engagement that awaken a heightened sensibility towards the living world through cooperative links, casting other beings as subjects and agents of filmic processes, and, finally, reshaping the economy of filmmaking. Thus, ecologies of perception, medium, production, and multinaturalism are deployed, contributing to the restoration of our sensory bond with the natural world.

Several chapters were translated with the help of artificial intelligence. In each case, the text has subsequently been revised further by the author as well as the translator Charlie Hewison and a professional copy editor.

Elio Della Noce is a researcher and teacher in film studies at the Université Jean-Jaurès in Toulouse, France. His research focuses on ecological practices and commitments in experimental and contemporary Indigenous cinema. He is also an independent programmer and has curated film screenings at institutions in France as well as other countries.

Lucas Murari is a film researcher based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, with a PhD in Culture and Communication from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ). He has curated and programmed numerous screening programs and exhibitions for various institutions.