Critical Writing Index

All the Faces are Us: An Interview with Tom Chomont

by Scott Macdonald

Afterimage, Summer 1981, v. 9, no. 1 & 2, pp. 26-34

Filmmaker Tom Chomont discusses his artistic life. Beginning as a curator of experimental films in and around Boston, his shows were often shut down by police. He then began to show some of his own work in New York, but found that he was seen as a programmer rather than a filmmaker. He discusses his experience with depression and paranoia and his sexuality and dreams, all of which were manifested as images in his films. Chomont emphasises his technique of combining negatives and positives, which he says resembles solarized video, and creating 3-D effects with red and green filters. During a period when he was influenced by hallucinatory meditation techniques, he made Untitled, a film shot off the TV which treats the test pattern like a mandala and creates a symmetrical relationship between reversed images. His later films use found footage, out-takes and idiosyncratic processing techniques to create works that destroy and alienate the images, juxtaposng images that appear to be reversed because of their unusual composition and images that actually have been manipulated. Chomont insists his films are created entirely for the audience whose interpretation stands side by side with his own.

ITEM 1981.051 – available for viewing in the Research Centre

Videos, Artworks and Artists Cited

Phases of the Moon: the Parapsychology of Everda LifeTom Chomont

SongsStan Brakhage

SongtraitsStan Brakhage

AvocadaBIll Vehr

BrothelBill Vehr

Match GirlAndy Meyer

An Early Clue to the New DirectionAndy Meyer

Normal LoveJack Smith

Un Chant d'AmourJean Gênet

Night BlossomsTom Chomont

The Cat LadyTom Chomont

OpheliaTom Chomont

FlamesTom Chomont

Morpheus in HellTom Chomont

T,O,U,C,H.I,N,GPaul Sharits

A Persian RugTom Chomont

OblivionTom Chomont

FireworksKenneth Anger

Minor RevisionsTom Chomont

Mouse in our FaceTom Chomont

twice a ManGeorge Markopolous

UntitledTom Chomont

PortretTom Chomont

AriaTom Chomont

Lijn IITom Chomont

abdaTom Chomont

Re:birthTom Chomont

Tom Chomont

Love ObjectsTom Chomont

Re:incarnation

Tom Chomont

The HeavensTom Chomont

EarthTom Chomont

Space Time StudiesTom Chomont

Minor RevisionsRobert Beavers

The Count of Days