Critical Commentary of Rhythm 21
Hans Richter (1888-1976) was a German artist who explored the new medium of film in the early 1920’s to experiment with his vision of abstractionism. Early in his career, Richter was a painter whose works are considered Cubist. He spent six months in the German Army during World War where he has injured. He was a founding member of Zurich Dada and later the Action Committee of Revolutionary Artists. With the failings of these political ventures, Richter turned his talents to pure abstractionism in his painting and embarked in film experimentation. Richter spoke of his work, “I gradually lost interest in the subject – any subject –and focused instead on the positive-negative (white-black) opposition, which at least gave me a working hypothesis whereby I could organize the relationship of one part of a painting to the other.”
Rhythm 21 (Rhymus 21) made in 1921 clearly represents Richter’s black and white relationship. The short film was in response to previous film work that Richter had embarked on with friend and fellow artist, Viking Eggeling, a Swedish artist. Their first attempts experimenting in the new genre of film included the filming and adaptation of scrolls they had produced. Eggeling continued to film hand drawn animations and Richter moved on to manipulating forms and filming them. In this manner, he discovered the rhythm of film. Rhythm 21 exemplifies Richter’s voice in expression through the contrast of black and white, movement and rhythm as it could exist in film.
Rhythm 21 is described as an absolute film. An absolute film is an experiment that depicts light, film frame and time. The mise en scene of Rhythm 21 are simple quadrilateral shapes: rectangles and squares. Richter moves these shapes to evoke the feeling of movement and rhythm. The piece is accompanied by a simple musical soundtrack of a drum, the bass and piano. The music articulates the movement of the shapes. The black and white contrast of the shapes and the background move against each other. At one moment the black appears to be the background and then the white moves in and takes over as the background.
The use of the camera is very simple. The camera is stationary and the shapes are moved and manipulated. By keeping the camera still and filming at the exact same distance throughout the film, Richter creates movement through the shapes not the movement of the camera. His techniques such as this are the early forms of animation. He uses the shapes to create the movement of pulling in close and then back again. The background is a planar and two dimensional. This is precisely what he was experimenting with in this animation, obtaining a rhythm of movement. It is the shapes that make the kinetic movement and not the camera.
The lighting is stark. Light shines directly onto Richter’s canvas and on occasion he reverses the film to utilize the opposite in negative shots. The use of the negative film emphasizes the relationship between the black and white he is trying to achieve. By keeping the lighting simple and highlighting the contrast between the black and white figures, Richter is able to focus the audience’s attention on the movement of the shapes. The movement becomes the rhythm of the film. He varies the speed at which the shapes move and pan into and out of the shot. At times it is very slow; one white rectangle moves in and expands to take over the space of the opposite or black background. At another moment, as the film builds several rectangles move onto and off of the canvas. Richter comments on the role of light in his film, “this film communicates very authentically the relationships of tension and contrast in the light. These relationships consist of light and dark, small and large, slow and fast, horizontal and vertical,”
Richter deliberately chose his simple soundtrack to accompany the movement of his shapes. In this experiment, the soundtrack complements the movement in the visual, the visual is not responding to the music. This non-diegetic score begins with a snare drum whose rhythm is mimicking the movement of the squares and rectangles. As Richter begins to experiment with the shapes in more complex ways by changing their rates of movement and complexities of the composition, the score incorporates an acoustic bass and then piano.
The juxtaposition of the shapes that Richter employs and their relationships to one another are created through the movement he creates. The pace of the film starts of slow and a little tentative or apprehensive. As Richter moves through the film, the pace becomes quickened and more confident. The result is a bold rhythm in both the movement of the simple shapes and the music.
Rhythm 21 is an excellent example of both Richter’s view as an artists and the evolving use of film in art. Richter abandoned his work as a painter to experiment and create with film. At the time, film was being commonly used for newsreels and penny dreadfuls. The use of film in this experimental manner was well received and it opened the door to the world of animation as both an art form and a commercial venture.
Bibliography
Hockensmith, Amanda, “Hans Richter,” DADA Companion, accessed April 17, 2015,
http://www.dada-companion.com/richter/
“Rhythmus 21”, Museum of Modern Art. Accessed April 17, 2015.
http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=91477
Stein, Jannon, “Abstract Films from the 1920’s: Making Rhythm Visible,” The Getty IRIS,
last modified June 13, 2011,
http://blogs.getty.edu/iris/abstract-films-from-the-1920s-making-rhythm-visible/
Suchenski, Richard, “Hans Richter,” Senses of Cinema. Accessed April 17, 2015.
http://sensesofcinema.com/2009/great-directors/hans-richter/
