Ole Miss Theatre and Film, in collaboration with the Southern Punk Archive, hosted a screening of avant-garde filmmaker Maya Deren’s short films with a live score by Memphis post-punk band Optic Sink, on Thursday, Sept. 18. The event followed the Thacker Mountain Radio show at the Powerhouse.
John Rash, the founder of the Southern Punk Archive, shared insight on the event’s reimagining of the beginnings of silent film.
“This goes back to the roots of cinema when silent films were made and would often have an orchestra perform live,” Rash said. “It’s sort of this hybrid experience of a concert in a film together.”
Maya Deren was a Ukrainian-born filmmaker and choreographer who spearheaded experimental and independent filmmaking from the 1930s to 1960s. Her films were self-funded and self-produced, straying from the industry norm of big production studios.
Optic Sink is a Memphis-based, post-punk project formed in 2019. Members include Natalie Hoffmann, Ben Bauermeister and Keith Cooper. The group boasts a dance-influenced ethereal sound that creates an absorbing mesh with Deren’s films.
Rash described the remarkable experience of mixing Optic Sink’s sound to Deren’s avant-garde visuals.
“I think, like Maya Deren, Optic Sink gets more into experimental and ambient areas that are a little bit less rock-and-roll and more about just feeling and emotion,” Rash said. “I think to see and hear their sound with these films is really quite a unique experience.”
The six short films screened were “The Very Eye of Night,” “At Land,” “Meditation on Violence,” “Ritual in Transfigured Time,” “Meshes of the Afternoon” and “A Study in Choreography.”
The short films were poetic and abstract with non-linear narratives. They were full of repetitive and dreamlike imagery that dealt with explorations of the psyche, the fluidity of time and the solidity of reality.
Deren acted in most of the films. Her background as a choreographer and dancer was prevalent in the films, all including dance sequences full of visual poetic expression.
Photo by Jack Kirkland
Maia Avila, a freshman chemistry major from Gautier, Miss., shared her favorite short film that was screened.
“‘Meshes of the Afternoon’ was my favorite,” Avila said. “It was suspenseful and the music definitely added onto it.”
Optic Sink’s live score was originally written and matched Deren’s films perfectly. The fragmentary pacing of the films was backed with ambient synth music that gave the films a new atmospheric edge.
Isabella Arellano, a freshman allied health studies major from Biloxi, Miss., spoke of the live score and what brought her to the event.
“I was told by my professor to come check out the show, and I wanted to experience something new,” Arellano said. “The music was really good, it definitely drew me in and kept me interested and entertained.”
While Deren’s films are more than half a century old, their relevance continues in the film and art scene. The screening of her films with Optic Sink’s live score encapsulated the persistence and prevalence of independent creative outlets.
