INTRO

'The entire project is more of a giant art installation than an argument to the film industry that vertical videos could replace the tried-and-true cinema experience. It is not an invitation to leave cinemas — which have been radically transformed over the past decade according to the diktat of the commercial film market — but a provocation to expand the image onto a new axis.'


- Josh Lowensohn, in The Verge


Vertical Cinema is a series of fourteen commissioned large-scale, site-specific works by internationally renowned experimental filmmakers and audiovisual artists, which are presented on 35 mm celluloid and projected vertically with a custom-built projector in vertical cinemascope. The programme premiered in 2013 and has since been screened at museums and festivals around the globe.

The fourteen experimental films made by Tina Frank (AT), Björn Kämmerer (DE/AT), Manuel Knapp (AT), Johann Lurf (AT), Joost Rekveld (NL), Rosa Menkman (NL), Billy Roisz (AT) & Dieter Kovačič (AT), Makino Takashi (JP) & Telcosystems (NL), Esther Urlus (NL), Martijn van Boven (NL) & Gert-Jan Prins (NL), Susan Schuppli (UK), Lukas Marxt (AT), HC Gilje (NO), BJ Nilsen (SE) & Karl Lemieux (CA) are screened live on a vertical monument. They are a unique blend of abstract cinema, structural experiments, found footage remixes, chemical film explorations and live laser action. The artists offer their view of ‘vertical axis art’, and the results of this challenging commission are fascinating.