Porumboiu Andersson Hogg Acta Film11 03
Porumboiu Andersson Hogg Acta Film11 03
Porumboiu Andersson Hogg Acta Film11 03
This work was supported by a grant of the Romanian Ministry of National Education, CNCS
UEFISCDI, project number PN-II-ID-PCE-2012-4-0573.
"EN"REWSTERAND,EA*ACOBSDElNETHETABLEAUAShACHARACTERISTICTYPEOFSHOTINEARLYlLMS
and a type of constructions which relies on that type of shot. This is the centred axial long shot,
40
GNES0ETH
BECOMEKEYlGURESOFAMANNERISTAESTHETICANDAKINDOFSHORTHANDTOCONNECT
the narrative to a certain period in history (see Vidal 2012). It is however, in the
CATEGORYOFARTHOUSElLMSWHEREWESEEAPUZZLINGCOMPLEXITYINTHEUSEOFTHE
tableau. It can be seen as a recurring device of contemplative slow movies
that have ETCHED OUT THEIR OWN NICHE ON THE INTERNATIONAL lLM FESTIVAL CIRCUIT
in the last decades, lyrical documentaries, and experimental works bordering
on installation art. We may recall in this respect the almost still tableaux of
Pedro Costa or Bla Tarr3 Alexander Sokurovs 3PIRITUAL 6OICES (Dukhovnye
golosa, 1995) documenting the life of soldiers in a permanent state of war on
THEBORDERBETWEEN4ADJIKISTANAND!FGHANISTANWHICHFEATURESINITSlRSTPART
ASUBLIMEMORETHANMINUTESLONG SCENEOFAWINTERLANDSCAPElLMEDWITH
lXED CAMERA SLOWLY CHANGING IN TIME *EAN
#LAUDE 2OUSSEAUS DOCUMENTARY
essay, 4HE %NCLOSED 6ALLEY (La valle close, 1995) with its images composed
AS 2OMANTIC LANDSCAPE PAINTINGS THE SERIES OF TABLEAUX DEPICTING RURAL LIFE IN
Michelangelo Frammartinos ,E 1UATTRO 6OLTE OR *OHN !KOMFRAHS The
Nine Muses (2010) alternating found footage with painterly compositions of
MAJESTICSTILLNESS)NTHECATEGORYOFlLMSCONCEIVEDLIKEINSTALLATIONPIECES, the
examples may include: Lav Diazs beautiful &ROM7HATIS"EFORE (-ULASA+UNG
Ano ang Noon A MORE THAN lVE AND a half hours long motion picture
EXPERIENCEUNFOLDINGINLENGTHYTABLEAUSHOTS4SAI-ING
,IANGS7ALKER
SERIES
contrasting in long takes the hustle and bustle of contemporary urban landscapes
(Hong Kong, Marseille, Tokyo) with the extreme slow walk of a Buddhist monk
EGTHESHORTlLMS7ALKER*OURNEYTOTHE7EST No, no Sleep, 2015),
ORHISFEATURElLMCONSISTINGOFLOOSELYCONNECTEDSINGLESHOTSEQUENCESStray
Dogs (2013), etc. These examples, pinpointing some of my latest revelations in
THElELDAREHOWEVERONLYMEANTTOTENTATIVELYRIPPLETHESURFACEOFAVASTAREA
where discussions about the cinematic tableau may be relevant today. The scope
of this article is in fact much narrower. Instead of an inventory of this stylistic
device in different areas of world cinema, I merely propose to unravel certain
paradigmatic features of the renewed aesthetic of the tableau, hoping in the
PROCESSTOCONTRIBUTETOAMORERElNEDUNDERSTANDINGOFTHEPOETIChMECHANISMv
OF THIS lGURE ) WILL DO THIS THROUGH AN ANALYSIS OF A MORE DELIMITED CORPUS
OF lLMS THE RECENT WORKS OF THREE %UROPEAN AUTHORS THE 2OMANIAN #ORNELIU
Porumboiu, the Swedish Roy Andersson and the British Joanna Hogg). All of
LOOKINGATANINTERIORASIFATABOXSETONSTAGEFROMTHECENTREOFTHETHEATRESTALLS-ANYEARLYlLMS
CONSISTLARGELYOFSUCHSHOTSLINKEDBYINTERTITLESTHEYLACKSCENEDISSECTIONOREVENALTERNATION
between simultaneous scenes. This has come to be called tableau construction (1998, 38).
3EEATHEORETICALDISCUSSIONOFTHEPHOTO
lLMICQUALITIESOFTHESEIN0ETH
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
41
THESEAUTHORSSEEMTOHAVEDESIGNATEDTHETABLEAUASADElNINGELEMENTOFTHEIR
style, resulting in works that are very different, but that somehow still share a set
OFKEYFEATURES!COMPARATIVEANALYSISOFTHEIRlLMSMAYIDENTIFYANDMAPSOME
OFTHEMOSTIMPORTANTINmECTIONSOFTHETABLEAUFORMINCONTEMPORARYlLMART
In the broadest sense the premise of my investigation is twofold. On the one
hand I situate the tableau within the interpretive framework of intermediality,
viewing it in terms of overlapping forms of art and culture, with elements derived
from painting, theatre, photography, performance, and new media. On the other
hand, closely connected to this, and acknowledging the permutational quality
of the tableau (i.e. its possibilities for variation), which has been extensively
treated in the writings of Nol Burch (1979) and David Bordwell (1981, 1988),4
) REGARD THE CINEMATIC TABLEAU NOT ONLY AS A UNIT DElNED BY CERTAIN lXED AND
mEXIBLEPARAMETERSASASETOFSTYLISTICMARKERSBUTASA highly transgressive and
performative structure.5 The tableau is always able to bring forth the intermediality
of cinema as a productive in-betwenness,6 assigning the form of one medium (e.g.
painting, photography, theatrical mise-en-scne TOACTASAMEDIUMFORASPECIlC
lGURETHETABLEAUSHOT INTHEOTHERMEDIUMCINEMA 7 Consequently, we should
try to understand the variations of the tableau shot also by mapping out the network
of media connections and the dynamics of in-betweenness that they enable. The
cinematic image may open up towards painterly vedutas, domestic genre scenes,
theatrical arrangements or operatic tableaux performances, in other cases we have
a more stylized picture, an ornamental composition, or a minimalistic play upon
stillness and motion, rhythm and stasis, depth and surface, or we may behold
4
5
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See Frieds analysis of Jeff Walls photo-exhibits, meticulously staging scenes of everyday life
(Fried 2008), or his discussion of the anti-theatricality of Douglas Gordons video installations
(Fried 2011, 2015).
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
43
44
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EXPLICIT MEDIA REmEXIVITY 2OY !NDERSSON KNOWN FOR HIS lLMS COMPILED OF
grotesque, surrealist vignettes mixing elements of painting, theatre and opera),
and Joanna Hogg (experimenting with low-key realism combined with a high
degree of stylization in the image, revitalizing the role of architecture in the
intermedial texture of cinema). Although concerned with diverse topics, these
three authors are all remarkable for the way in which they excavate the affordances
of the tableaus intermedial and performative space, relying on the combination
BETWEENREALISMANDARTIlCIALITYANDFORGINGNOTONLYHIGHLYORIGINALCINEMATIC
styles based on the rigorous aesthetic of the tableau shot, but also conceptualizing
THElGUREOFTHETABLEAU
We can compare in this respect the paintings of Antonello da Messina: St. Jerome in his Study
(14601475) and those of Pieter de Hooch or Samuel van Hoogstraten in Figs. 14.
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
45
ASWELLASTHEIDEAOFLIMINALITYINANUNPRECEDENTEDWAY"ESIDESREmECTINGA
WAYOFLIFEASOCIALANDGENDEREDSTRATIlCATIONOFAWORLDOFEVERYDAYNESSAND
domesticity10 by giving access to the anatomy of the Dutch household with the
depiction of kitchens, pantries, living rooms, studios, these paintings introduce
a play between the foreground and the background, interior and exterior. They
stage a plunge through, as suggested by the literal meaning of the Dutch word,
doorsien, applied to this technique: an entrance for the eyes to a deep interior,
often with a tiny back room, or an access to a courtyard, a window to the outside,
where the scene assimilates the street and the city beyond (Hollander 2002,
58), and where the space of the tableau is conceived in-between enclosure and
openness, reaching beyond the demarcation of a private and public world. The
HUMANlGUREAPPEARSINTHESEPAINTINGSCAUGHTINTHEATRICAL11 poses wavering
between two worlds, like the doorway-bound eavesdropper that we see in the
famous series by Nicolaes Maes who is always equally protagonist and beholder,
spectacle and spectator, both within and without the pictorial narrative (Cole
2006, 20). Maess Eavesdroppers thematize the latent tension between secrecy
and disclosure, between the enclosure of a private world within the cluster of
rooms and the gaze that repeatedly penetrates it through the apertures in Dutch
chamber art. [Figs. 78.] The division of the inner space also enables an intense
play upon framing and de-framing, upon the visible and the invisible, as we are
allowed to peep through doors and windows,12 yet the rooms are all fragmented,
there are inner walls between doors and windows impenetrable to the gaze, and
we also have all kinds of objects occluding the view.13 Through the opening of
doors and windows, what is outside (the real world beyond the canvas) becomes
an image for the inside, thus the viewer is simultaneously inside and outside the
painting (cf. Hammer-Tugendhat 2015, 292). Therefore the art historian Victor I.
Stoichita described these as self-aware images, explaining how, in effect, the
view through the doorway became the metaphor of painting (1998, 54). Dutch
10
11
12
13
As Charles Rices book summarizes, these were notions which enhanced the popularity of
these paintings two centuries later, in the nineteenth-century, when concepts such as privacy,
intimacy, comfort and home became relevant in the context of the emerging importance of
bourgeois family life as the nucleus for the idea of the Dutch nation (cf. Rice 2007, 22).
Both Westermann (1996) and Hollander (2002) emphasize the theatricality of Dutch genre painting,
with characters also exchanging looks with the viewer, comparable to asides on the stage.
Samuel van Hoogstratens famous 0EEPSHOWWITH6IEWSOFTHE)NTERIOROFA$UTCH(OUSE (1655
1660), exhibited in the National Gallery in London, with its actual peep-hole embodies this
structure, combining an enclosed box hiding a view that is magically opened up through the
aperture inviting the viewers gaze deeper and deeper inside. [Fig. 5.]
See more about the play upon the visible and invisible in seventeenth-century Dutch painting
in Hammer-Tugendhat (2015).
46
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interior painting appears in this way also as a secular investigation into the nature
of images after the age of iconoclasm, framing a fragment of life alongside a
subtle staging of imageness itself (i.e. the perception of the world as an image,
where the doors/windows to the outside are also doors to the inside: means for
ASELF
REmEXIVEEXAMINATIONOFTHEARTOFPAINTINGREINFORCEDALSOALONGSIDETHE
multiplication of inner frames, by the presence of pictures hanging on the walls).
In her seminal work on Dutch art, Svetlana Alpers emphasized that the Dutch
present their pictures as describing the world seen rather than as imitations of
SIGNIlCANTHUMANACTIONSvALLEGORIESORNARRATIVESXXVI ANDCONSIDERED
THATTHISMETICULOUShARTOFDESCRIPTIONvREmECTEDAWAYOFTHINKINGDETERMINED
BYCONTEMPORARYSCIENTIlCAPPROACHESLIKEOPTICSORMAPMAKINGATTESTEDBYTHE
maps, globes, and telescopes appearing in these depicted homes).
On the other hand, the tight assemblage of elements of these domestic interiors
and niche pictures have also been associated with the structure of emblems (cf.
Hollander 2002, 7779). And just like the emblem books, these dense painterly
descriptions, often convey a covert moralizing intent (e.g. Hammer-Tugendhat
2015).14 Last but not least, as Hollander states, the use and reuse of particular
FORMALCONVENTIONSREmECTSTHEFORMULAICREPETITIVENATUREOF$UTCHARTv
which institutes the Dutch interior compositions as one of the most recognizable
parametric scheme in painting, easily imitated or remodelled in later art, and
(trans-medially) adopted by the tableau mode in cinema.15
4HESPECIlCPERMUTATIONSOFTHETABLEAUTHATWESEEINTHElLMSOFTHETHREE
authors selected for analysis can all be interpreted starting from the paradigm
OF.ORTHERNBAROQUEPAINTINGSUMMARIZEDHERE)NALLOFTHEMWElNDTHATTHE
tableau form is closely connected to architectural space opening up through
inner frames, with protagonists inhabiting these spaces who are portrayed in
liminal situations. But instead of any dramatic action they are all caught in
mostly static, painterly poses, with dialogues delivered in single takes as if being
on a stage. Although there is no clearly moralizing intention, the tableau form
DOESCARRYANIMPLICITSOCIAL
PHILOSOPHICALCOMMENTARYINEACHCASEREmECTING
ONTHESOCIALSTRATIlCATIONANDISOLATIONOFINDIVIDUALSORONDIFFERENTWAYSOF
life encapsulated in this visual construction. In the vignettes of Roy Anderssons
trilogy of human condition, Songs from the Second Floor (Snger frn andra
vningen, 2000), You, the Living (Du levande, 2007), A Pigeon Sat on a Branch
14
15
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
47
48
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to the kitchen doors. The tableau form contributes to a revision of the aesthetic
OFREALISMIN(OGGSlLMSINWHICHTHETRADITIONALEMPHASISONWORKING CLASS
ISSUES THAT DElNED EARLIER TRENDS OF REALISM IN "RITISH CINEMA GIVES WAY TO
capturing everyday moments of private lives and a feeling of bourgeois ennui.17
)N 0ORUMBOIUS lLMS AGAIN THE DEMARCATION BETWEEN PUBLIC AND DOMESTIC
is continually blurred. In 12.08. East of Bucharest (A fost sau n-a fost, 2006)
and in Police, Adjective (0OLIIST ADJECTIV, 2009) the makeshift TV studio, the
police station and the apartments where the protagonists live look not only
similar, they are in fact the same specimens of rooms in typical East European
BLOCKSOFmATSBUILTDURINGTHETIMEOFCOMMUNISM)N7HEN%VENING&ALLSON
Bucharest, or Metabolism (#ND SE LAS SEARA PESTE "UCURETI THE lLM
DIRECTOR PROTAGONIST DISCUSSES HIS lLM PROJECT IN HIS OWN APARTMENT PRESENTED
in the same way as Dutch interiors. He also makes love to the leading actress
HEREBUTTHEEMPTYWALLSANDBASICFURNITUREMAKEITLOOKMORELIKEAlLMSTAGE
waiting to be properly furnished, than a home. Equipped with a brand new Apple
computer the apartment speaks of a new way of life mimicking Western models,
and appears as a clinical and impersonal any space whatever in the middle
OF THE NATIONS CAPITAL )N THIS WAY THE TABLEAU BECOMES IN 0ORUMBOIUS lLMS
a vehicle for an ironic depiction of the post-socialist spaces of life, where the
miserable uniformity of communist architecture slowly gives way to the chaotic
ENTANGLEMENTSOFOFlCESANDHOMESBROUGHTABOUTBYTHENEWPETTYENTREPRENEURS
who set up their businesses in the old housing projects by repurposing private
apartments, or to the dull emptiness of new domiciles, symptomatic of a desperate
EFFORTTOSEVERALLPALPABLETIESTOASPECIlCCULTURALPAST
$AVID&ORRESTDESCRIBESTHISTYPEOFREALISMIN(OGGSlLMSASTHEhSHIFTFROMTHEPUBLICTOTHE
PERSONALv BUTDOESNOTMENTIONTHEAESTHETICOFTHETABLEAUPROMINENTINHERlLMS
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
49
50
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19
The same sensation of exhibitedness is achieved in both Unrelated and Archipelago, for
example, through presenting the characters seated in closed group compositions outdoors,
surrounded by the picturesque landscape, as if they were posing for a painting.
Similarly, in Hoggs Exhibition we are even allowed to watch people in a scene from above
through a glass window, as if looking down at an exhibition case [Fig. 32].
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
51
his seminal article on dcadrage, Bonitzer speaks about the sadistic irony of
off-centre framing (2000, 201), and Porumboiu uses the visual gag of characters
trying to stay in the frame or being pushed out of frame in a sophisticated interplay
between framing and de-framing, between the still photograph of the town hall
in the background and the chaotic movement in front of it, which ultimately
calls attention to the principle of decentredness, of being off-centre, out-of-frame
ASTHEMAIN METAPHOR FORTHEWHOLElLMWHICHPRESENTS THEFAILEDATTEMPT TO
re-frame the everyday in a provincial town, far from the centre of action in
Bucharest, as revolution.
! SIMILAR DIRECTION OF INmECTING THE TABLEAU TOWARDS IRONIC DE
COMPOSITION
FRAGMENTATION IS PERCEIVABLE IN (OGGS lLMS WHERE WE ALSO HAVE A STRONG
CONCEPTUALIZATIONOFTHECHARACTERSDECENTREDNESSSUPPORTEDBYARICHSIGNIlCATION
of inventive de-framings ranging from melancholy, isolation, insensitivity to pure
visual abstraction [Figs. 4548]. We observe, for example, Anna, the heroine of
Unrelated (played by Kathryn Worth) in a series of anxious attempts both literally
and symbolically to stay in the frame, to maintain her social and emotional
relations (to her partner, who did not join her on this holiday, to her friends, who
MOSTLIKELYINVITEDHEROUTOFPITYANDCONSIDERHERANODDlTINTHEIRCIRCLES
pathetic in her efforts to be both part of the olds (as the teenagers call their
parents), and join the group of youngsters. We see the mother in Archipelago
talking on the phone in classic niche painting compositions as she repeatedly
struggles to bring the absent father into the picture. [Figs. 4950.]
52
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or communicating with someone beyond the visible space, but stuck in the
CINEMATICFRAME4HElRSTHALFOF0ORUMBOIUS%ASTOF"UCHAREST presents
the protagonists in domestic tableau scenes while all of them have lengthy
conversations on the phone, thus opening up each scene and interconnecting the
separate boxes they appear in.
A recurrent motif for Joanna Hogg is to set up scenes in which emotionally
charged dialogues are placed beyond our vision while other characters can
unwillingly overhear them, or are actively eavesdropping. During the vacation in
Italy in Unrelated there is a terrible row between father and son that we cannot
see, only hear, as they are inside the house, while the camera remains with the
rest of the family and friends, who are lounging outside by the pool and listening
to the quarrel in a long, awkward scene. In Archipelago, Hogg seems to adapt
the situation of Nicolaes Maess Eavesdropper series,20 with the open doorway,
THE EMPTY HALLWAY THE lGURE OF THE LISTENER STANDING ON THE THRESHOLD ONLY
this time without the joviality of the scene and without the scenario involving
sexual indiscretion. The mediumship of the listener, as the title of David Toops
book (2010) suggests, involves here a sinister resonance indeed. The picture
ISDARKGREYASIFlLTEREDTHROUGHMURKYWATERANDTHElGUREISWEIGHEDDOWN
not only by the words he is not supposed to hear, but also by what remains out
of sight (as Toop explains the eavesdropper cannot see, only look out into the
unknown future, 2010, 77). It is Edward, the irresolute young man (played by
Tom Hiddleston), who does not really know what to do in life, and is spending a
holiday with his mother and sister before leaving for a volunteer job in Africa. He
is overhearing the sobbing and shouting, self-humiliating mother talking with her
husband on the phone: a sight that he is surely not eager to behold. Although we
can observe him in the middle of a complex theatrical staging, the eavesdroppers
position is that of a self-erasing liminality: not only does he not see, he also draws
back so as not to be seen. What used to be a depiction of the life of servants or
inquisitive housewives in Dutch painting (and is actually paraphrased in some of
Hoggs scenes involving the cook), becomes here a powerful portrayal of Edwards
invisibility in the family. Despite being seemingly in the centre of the whole
situation (it is because of him that they are supposedly there), he has very little
say in matters regarding the family, even his repeated attempts to communicate
with the cook remain too feeble to amount to a proper relationship. He remains a
LINGERINGLIMINALlGUREINTHESHADOWOFANOPENDOORWAY;&IGSn=
20
The theme was so popular at the time that Maes himself painted six versions between 1655 and
1657 [e.g. Figs. 56].
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
53
Such scenes of eavesdropping make us aware of the way these spaces fold into
interconnected boxes that can both reveal and conceal, draw us in as complicit
witnesses and shut us out, with characters acting at the same time as go-betweens
and caught in the vertigo of frames, emphasized through the recurring in-depth
COMPOSITIONSOFHALLWAYS)N(OGGSPREVIOUSlLMASTHETITLEOFUnrelated already
suggests, Annas position within the group is not only an outsider, and she is not
only single (and becoming painfully aware of being unmarried and childless), but
SHEISTRAPPEDINHERROLECONCEIVEDASANEXTENSIONOFTHEMARGINALlGUREOFTHE
eavesdropper, listening in at conversations most of the time, and observing how
other people live their lives.
Porumboius Police, Adjective adopts a similar mechanism of looking and
listening in at a scene (staged as a compartment of the tableau) within the
FRAMEWORKOFANARRATIVEDERIVEDFROMDETECTIVElLMS(EREINTHElGUREOFTHE
policeman who is surveilling three high-school students suspected of using drugs,
we dont just observe the characters from a distance, but observe a character who
is himself observing other characters from a distance and moving continuously
on a meandering trajectory around the same typically miserable post-communist
BLOCKS OF mATS GARAGES AND SPORTS GROUNDS IN AND OUT OF SPACES PRESENTED AS
boxes, again in a string of tableaux. [Figs. 5558.]
)N-ICHAEL&RIEDSVIEWTHEREALISTTRADITIONINPAINTINGPRESENTSlGURESTHATARE
absorbed in their daily activities and are totally oblivious of the viewer (resulting
in a tableau that is hermetically sealed off from the world surrounding it).
-ODERNARTHOWEVERRELIESONTHEPRESENCEOFTHEVIEWERINFRONTOFTHEARTWORKITS
constructedness is obvious and the awareness of the spectators gaze (the quality he
names, theatricality, to be seen-ness) is encoded within the picture. On the one
hand, the alternation of the hermetically sealed, realistic scene with its opening up
through diegetic off-screen and off-frame spaces, and the introduction of characters
as observers or eavesdroppers already introduces a kind of stage theatricality into
THESElLMSSIMILARLYTOTHESEMANTICSOF$UTCHINTERIORPAINTINGS /NTHEOTHER
HANDTHElLMSALSOSEEMTOEXPOSETHECLASHBETWEENTHEABSORPTIVEFEATURESOF
THE SCENE AND THE AWARENESS OF THE IMAGE AS ARTIlCIAL CONSTRUCTION THROUGH THE
REmEXIVEDOUBLEFRAMINGSANDBYWAYOFOVERWRITINGCLASSIChTRANSPARENCYvINTHE
moving image with perceivable forms of mediation, so that many scenes display the
quality of imageness, a theatricality of representation as the most striking quality.
Anderssons one-shot sequences convert everyday situations into highly stylized
IMAGESUNDERTHEINmUENCEOFTHEPAINTERSLIKE(IERONYMUS"OSCH&RANCISCO'OYA
or Otto Dicks. The tableau intended as a cinematic paraphrase of Jean-Franois
54
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Millets Noonday Rest (1866)21 is a beautiful example of this. [Figs. 5960.] Keeping
just a few gestural and chromatic elements to remind us of Millets composition, but
creating an image which is at the same time remarkable in its serenity (the intimacy
of the couple, the faithful family dog, the peacefulness of the scene) and in its
bleakness (with the isolation of the couple, the stretch of dusty earth at the dreary
periphery of the urban landscape), the tableau is subordinated to no narrative,
merely exhibited in a long take for us to see and contemplate as a single picture.
The interiors of Joanna Hoggs Archipelago appear in an almost monochromatic
palette, recalling the pale, melancholic interiors in the paintings of Vilhelm
Hammershi, while some of the frames of Exhibition look like the paintings of
David Hockney. Moreover, in Archipelago the characters themselves view the
world in terms of painting as they pass the time by learning to paint and have
long conversations about it with a painter, Christopher, who acts both as a friend
and a tutor, maybe even standing in for the absent father (played by the real life
landscape painter, Christopher W. Baker). [Figs. 6162.] In Exhibition we have a
couple of artists living in a very artistic house22hALLVERTICALSREmECTINGWINDOWS
and sliding partitions,23 Figs. 6366) and where the female protagonist is busy
transforming her own body into art: she is preoccupied with exhibiting herself
as a kind of re-embodiment of Gian Lorenzo Berninis Ecstasy of Saint Teresa
(16471652), studying the picture on her computer and in books, trying out poses,
costumes and props, putting on a private performance (most likely as a rehearsal
of an art project to be presented later in a gallery). This, however, does not seem like
SOMEKINDOFIDENTIlCATIONWITHTHESAINTMORELIKEAFASCINATIONWITHTHERAPTURE
EXPRESSED BY "ERNINIS FAMOUS SCULPTURE AS SHE HERSELF IS lXATED ON HER OWN
body and sexual desires. [Figs. 6770.] Still her self-exhibitions seem to be more
abstract and restrained, something that is more in line with the stark modernism
of the architecture of the house and less in tune with her much more ardent sexual
FANTASIES THAT WE LEARN OF IN OTHER SCENES ,IKE THE lGURES APPEARING IN $UTCH
interior paintings, who are always in close relationship with the architectural
space, Joanna Hoggs characters have been devised to appear as if they might
ALMOSTBElGURESINAPAINTINGPLACEDWITHINTHEFRAMEPROVIDEDBYTHEHOUSEv24
21
22
23
24
Andersson speaks about this in the commentary available on the DVD edition of the movie.
Designed by James Melvin in 1969 and redesigned by Sauerbruch Hutton Architects sometime
after the 1990s.
Exhibition, press book: HTTPWWWKINOLORBERCOMDATAPRESSKIT%8()")4)/.?PRESSBOOKPDF
Last accessed 25. 08. 2015.
3EE THE lLMS PRESS BOOK HTTPWWWKINOLORBERCOMDATAPRESSKIT%8()")4)/.?PRESSBOOK
pdf. Last accessed 25. 08. 2015.
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
55
)FWEDISSECTTHISMODULATIONOFTHETABLEAUSPACEMORECLOSELYWEWILLlNDTHAT
INFACT0ORUMBOIUAND(OGGDElNETWOCHARACTERISTICDIRECTIONSINWHICHSUCH
a duality of absorption and theatricality can be polarized within the cinematic
tableau, as the following brief subchapters will present.
A 2EALISMVS!BSTRACTIlCATION
In Porumboius Police, Adjective we see the young policeman, Cristi completely
absorbed in his daily activities, in a naturalistic environment, deeply embedded
in his world (as the series of inner frames suggest), and there is no scene in
THE lLM WHICH WOULD SHOW US HIS SUBJECTIVE VIEWPOINT WE ALWAYS BEHOLD
everything from the outside, watching it all perceptibly from somewhere offframe.25 [Fig. 71.] The tableau shot appears here not as a vehicle for satire, but
as a minimalistic container for reality presented as a fragment torn from a larger
WHOLE A hFOUND OBJECTv FRAMED BY THE VIEWlNDER OF THE CAMERA -OREOVER A
SELF
CONSCIOUSNESSABOUTLANGUAGERUNSASALEITMOTIFINTHElLMPEOPLEINTHIS
lLMDONTJUSTENGAGEINCONVERSATIONSTHEYPEDANTICALLYDISSECTTHEMEANINGOF
WORDS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SIGNIlER AND SIGNIlED EG THE SCENE BETWEEN
Cristi and his wife, arguing about the lyrics of a pop song). In addition to this, we
SEEANINCREASEDEMPHASISONDIFFERENTFORMSOFWRITINGRANGINGFROMTHEGRAFlTI
in the street to the handwritten police report and to the printed page brought into
CLOSE
UP 4HE lNAL FACE
OFF ABOUT SEMANTICS BRINGS ALL THESE ELEMENTS TOGETHER
and appears as a cynical literalization driving to the extreme the mechanisms
of distanciation, abstraction (or theatricalization) already manifest in the visual
CONSTRUCTION OF THE lLM (ERE THE POLICEMAN WHO HAS BEEN RELUCTANT TO ARREST
a teenager for smoking a few hash cigarettes, is ordered by his commander to
look up the meaning of the words conscience, moral, law, and police in
ADICTIONARYANDINTHEENDWESEEHOWDETAILEDlELDTACTICSTOAPPREHENDTHE
kid are chalked up on a blackboard. Thus, the letter of the law imposed with the
authority of the police prevails over the qualms tormenting the young detective.
Instead of the act of de-framing that emerged as the ultimate metaphor in 12.08.
East of BucharestHEREWEHAVEAlLMWHICHISBUILTONTHESTRUCTURALPRINCIPLE
OF hEN
FRAMINGv CONTAINMENT ENTRAPMENT THE DElNITION OF THE INDElNITE IE
putting things into a box, underscored by the image of the grid, of various
inner frames), and reveals a process of brutally overwriting presentation with
25
4HUSOURPRESENCEASSPECTATORSISINSCRIBEDINTHElLMSTECHNIQUESDEVISEDTOPRODUCEIMAGES
to be seen, to be comprehended at one glace as a tableau.
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56
representation. [Figs. 7376.] The scene happens to be also the most rigid and
meticulously composed visual tableau, featuring once again an improvised panel
of three people arranged symmetrically in a room. The decorative bowl of fruit
brought in and placed in the middle of the table even brings back a touch of the
deadpan humour based on incongruities that dominated Porumboius previous
lLMNOTONLYBECAUSEITISOUTOFPLACEINAPOLICESTATIONBUTALSOBECAUSEIT
reminds us of the conventional symbolism of the holy trinity in Orthodox icons
(as we see it, for example, in Andrei Rublevs Troitsa from 1425142726). [Figs.
7778.] This last scene stages a kind of theatre of the absurd conceived as a
hTHEATRE OF THE ABSTRACTv BY PLAYING OFF THE OBJECTIlCATION OF WRITTEN LANGUAGE
against the absorptive realism of the images. Police becomes thus the attribute
OFTHEPROCEDUREINWHICHSUBJECTIVECONSCIENCEISSTImEDBYBUREAUCRACYAND
the complexity of reality is traded in for entries in a dictionary.
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
57
the rigid, mechanical frame around the character condenses like an emblem the
ANTITHESIS MANIFEST IN EACH OF (OGGS lLMS )NTERIORS COMPOSED IN ACCORDANCE
with the paradigm established by Dutch paintings are counterpointed with long
sequences in which the theatrical or architectural gives way to the pictorial (that
#HRISTOPHERTHEPAINTERDElNESINArchipelago as chaos, something not solid
or anchored). We have airy shots featuring all the elements of nature (earth, water,
vegetation in exotic shapes, rocks, sand, wind, etc., see Figs. 7982) to convey a
sensuous context for the modest ambitions of hedonism of these characters, who
take walks, immerse themselves into pools of mud, eat exquisite food prepared
for them by a private cook, or make art. In these shots the cinematic tableau taps
INTOTHEIMPLICITSENSUALITYOFTHESCENESINGENREPAINTINGAS(OGGSlLMSSEEMTO
celebrate in their own, understated way the full sensorium.27
Liquidity, on the other hand, is also achieved by building a whole aural
landscape,28 a rich universe of sounds.29(OGGUSESNOMUSICALSCOREINHERlLMS
JUSTTHESUBTLYAMPLIlED SOUNDSOFTHEENVIRONMENT 7EHEARTHERUSTLEOFTHE
leaves, the wind in the trees, the clinking of the spoons in the teacups, the song
of birds, or the hammering noises of the construction workers on the other side
of the street. This ambience of sounds does not only announce the presence of
AWORLDOUTSIDETHEFRAMEANDUNDERSCORETHESENSORYOVERmOWINGOPULENCEOF
the tableau, it also reminds the viewer of the fault line between the discursive
and the non-discursive, perceptual elements of the cinematic image. In the
meanwhile, the protagonists appear in abeyance, being deprived of a classical
dramatic structure, they remain stuck in the rigidity of the tableau. Moreover,
(OGGS hGLASSED
INv lGURES ARE NOT ONLY REPEATEDLY SHOWN GAZING BEYOND THE
frame, scrutinizing the unknown, caught in poses reminiscent of paintings,
but as the large windows in Exhibition fold the outside world onto the inside
THROUGHTHEMULTIPLEOVERLAPPINGREmECTIONSANDTHROUGHTHESYMPHONYOFTHE
city penetrating the walls, a unique reciprocity emerges, the liquid intelligence
27
28
29
Dutch paintings also manifest a visible ambition to portray the totality of the senses, together
with a similar opposition between the order and control of geometric shapes and the randomness
or the chaos of sheer sensuality that can disrupt the tranquility of the scene (achieved, for
example, through the presence of vegetation exposed to the elements, children that can prove
uncontrollable in any moment, cats and dogs walking into the frame, birds just about to burst
into song).
Joanna Hogg speaks about this in an interview, declaring: for me the aural landscape of the
lLM IS AS IMPORTANT IF NOT MORE IMPORTANT THAN THE VISUAL LANDSCAPEv 3EE HTTPWWW
littlewhitelies.co.uk/features/articles/joanna-hogg-2-26487.)
Toop has demonstrated that Dutch paintings are also remarkable for evoking a variety of sounds:
hTHEMATERIALITYOFSOUNDALSOmOWSTHROUGHTHESESUPPOSEDLYSECUREANDENCLOSINGINTERIORSv
(2010, 105).
58
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of photography also pours over, and (to paraphrase Wall) seems to study these
people from a not too great distance. [Figs. 8385.]
4HElLMWASSHOTUSINGTRADITIONALlLMSTOCK
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
59
(and does not have the necessity to include elements of theatrical drama). What
we see are a series of permutations: the shot in the car is repeated twice (once at
NIGHTONCEDURINGDAYTIME THEREARETWOSCENESIN0AULSAPARTMENTFOLLOWED
by three scenes at the restaurant and the bar, concluding with two scenes in the
TRAILERUSEDFORTHEPURPOSESOFTHElLMSHOOT3OWEMAYWONDERISANALOGUE
lLMBEINGFRAMEDBYADIGITALMEDIUMINTHESEPROLONGEDTABLEAUSHOTSORVICE
VERSA )S THE NOSTALGIA FOR THE LIMITATIONS OF ANALOGUE lLM POURED INTO A FORM
TAILOREDBYDIGITALCINEMA&URTHERMOREDOESTHElLMSELF
REmEXIVELYENACTTHE
passage of moving images from the traditional black box of the movie theatre
to the white cube of the modern art gallery,31ORTHEIRhREmUXvTHECONTENTOF
AGALLERYMOVIEPOUREDINTOAlCTIONlLM ASTHEhMETABOLISMvOFSLOWCINEMA
)N THIS INmECTION OF THE CINEMATIC TABLEAU SPACE APPEARS SOMETHING THAT IS
not lived in but consumed, discarded, rotated within the string of autonomous
sequences. Roy Andersson, in particular, is famous for his elaborate way of
conceiving and constructing each scene as an individual installation piece,
INVOLVING ARTIlCIALLY BUILT SETS IN A STUDIO 4HE SCENES APPEAR AS A SERIES OF
dioramas, or compartments of a revolving stage, where certain settings return, but
the emphasis is on fragmentation and on the episodes that could also be watched
as independent shorts.32
7EALSOSEETHISINTHEWAYINWHICHTHEPROTAGONISTSIN*OANNA(OGGSlLMSUSE
up their spaces and then leave. Both Unrelated and Archipelago are bookended
by the arrival of the protagonists at a house where they spend a few days, and
their departure at the end of their vacation. Bye, house is the last line spoken
in Archipelago as the cleaners arrive, and the family vacates the rooms. In
Exhibition there is no reason why the couple want to sell their home and move
ONBUTWElNALLYUNDERSTANDTHATnDESPITEASHORTDREAMLIKEmASHBACKOFTHE
couple as newlyweds running up the stairs there is no substantial personal
HISTORYSEEPEDINTOTHEWALLSOFTHEHOUSEJUSTART4HEEDIlCEACTSLIKEAPIECE
of interactive installation shaped by the people who live there and, in turn,
shaping the lives of its occupants, embodying and housing desires and anxieties
to make art and to live the art. The paraphrases of The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa
in form of tableaux vivants that the woman protagonist repeatedly performs are
as much about self-expression through her bond with Berninis sculpture as
about the expression of the symbiosis between her body, her artistic persona, and
31
32
Following their introduction by ODoherty (1976) these notions have been widely theorized in
art history, see for example, Uroskie (2014).
This aesthetics of fragmentation is probably related to Anderssons longstanding work as a
PROLIlCDIRECTOROFADVERTISEMENTSANDSHORTlLMS
60
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the house. Berninis Saint Teresa, displayed in an aedicule of the church Santa
Maria della Vittoria in Rome [Fig. 67], designed as a small theatre, may perhaps
be seen not only as an image blending bodily and spiritual joy in the moment of
transverberation, but as a prototype for a sculpture conceived as a performance
and as the portrayal of a woman passionately blending in with architecture.33 In
the same vein, Hoggs heroine repeatedly folds her body around the corners of
the rooms, hugging parts of the house in quiet moments of solitude [Figs. 8990],
while the house itself seems to fold over her body, as the pattern of the Venetian
blinds on the windows and the straight lines of the house are echoed in the
VARIOUSSTRIPEDOUTlTSTHATSHEWEARS
Thus, the house both encloses around her while she is immersed in her
private, interactive performance, and opens up as a theatrical space, a
hWHITE CUBEv INSIDE THE lLM THAT WE MAY OBSERVE FROM ALL SIDES AND ANGLES
[Figs. 9192].34&ROMTHEOUTSIDEITDISPLAYSTHEREmECTIONOFTHEBRANCHESAND
leaves projected onto the large window pane exhibited as an abstract image
facing the viewer, and it reveals the womans private performance as a partially
veiled peep-show through the striped openings of the blinds. In several scenes
VIEWED BOTH FROM THE INSIDE AND OUTSIDE IT APPEARS LIKE A GLASS CAGE mOATING
above the street, enframing and deframing a fragment of the visible world. As
a cubic container, the house sometimes appears not only as an elegant piece of
modernist architecture, but as a disconcerting maze consuming the nerves of
the heroine with its strange noises, multiple compartments and moveable walls.
It emerges even like a futuristic greenhouse of human habitation nesting an
amazing collection of plants together with rocks, artefacts and pieces of modern
technology. The staircase that looks like a metallic DNA spiral epitomizes the
CONNECTION BETWEEN THE NATURAL AND THE ARTIlCIAL ;&IGS = TRANSFORMING
the construction into a kind of modern day Leviathan that has engulfed its
33
34
*OANNA (OGG ALSO MENTIONS THE INmUENCE OF 'ASTON "ACHELARDS Poetics of Space in thinking
about the house as a living organism, a vessel of memory and feeling, and the inspiration drawn
from Louise Bourgeoiss series called Femme MaisonhABOUTWOMANANDBUILDINGINTEGRATED
woman as house. See the online interview in CineVue: HTTPWWWCINE
VUECOM
interview-joanna-hogg-unravels.html. Last accessed 25. 08. 2015.
4HEEMPTYROOMALREADYDEVOIDOFFURNITURESHOWNINTHElLMLOOKSUNCANNILYSIMILARTOAN
actual exhibition space [Fig. 92] reminding us at the same time how a white cube is never a
neutral container but a modern architectural space which is often exploited for its interaction
with the art hosted within its walls. The walls assimilate, the art discharges, writes ODoherty
(1986, 79). Moreover, in certain cases the exhibition hall itself becomes the exhibition, context
BECOMES CONTENT SEE $OHERTY n (OGGS lLM SPOTLIGHTS THIS INTERDEPENDENCE THE
house exhibits its content (the life of the married couple, their dreams and their actions), and is
exhibited for us to see as an active protagonist alongside the characters inhabiting it.
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
61
References
Alpers, Svetlana. 1983. The Art of Describing. Dutch Art in the Seventeenth
Century. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Balzs, Bla. 2010 [1924, 1930]. %ARLY&ILM4HEORY6ISIBLE-ANAND4HE3PIRITOF
Film. New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books.
Bellour, Raymond. 2007 [1984]. The Pensive Spectator. In The Cinematic, ed. David
Campany, 119123. London: Whitechapel and Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT
Press.
Blom, Ivo. 2010. Frame, Space, Narrative. Doors, Windows and Mobile Framing
in the Films of Luchino Visconti. !CTA 5NIVERSITATIS 3APIENTIAE &ILM AND
Media Studies vol. 2: 91107.
Bonitzer, Pascal. 2000 [1978]. Deframings. In Cahiers du Cinma. 6OLUME&OUR
n (ISTORY )DEOLOGY #ULTURAL 3TRUGGLE, ed. David Wilson, 196203.
London and New York: Routledge.
Bordwell, David. 1981. The Films of Carl Theodor Dreyer. Berkeley, Los Angeles:
University of California Press.
Bordwell, David. 1988. /ZUANDTHE0OETICSOF#INEMA. London, Princeton: BFI
Publishing, Princeton University Press.
Brewster, Ben and Lea Jacobs. 1998. 4HEATRETO#INEMA3TAGE0ICTORIALISMAND
the Early Feature Film. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
35
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63
64
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List of Figures
Figures 14. Antonello da Messina: St. Jerome in his Study (14601475), Pieter
de Hooch: A Mother Delousing her Childs Hair, also known as A Mothers Duty
(16581660), 9OUNG7OMANWITHA,ETTERANDA-ESSENGERINAN)NTERIOR (1670),
Samuel van Hoogstraten: 6IEWOFAN)NTERIOR, or The Slippers (16541662).
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
65
66
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Figures 912. Life contained within cubic spaces erasing the difference
between domestic and public locations: frame-grabs from Roy Anderssons lLMS
(910: You, the Livingn!0IGEON3ATONA"RANCH2EmECTINGON%XISTENCE).
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
67
68
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Figures 2528. The chamber art structure used for satirical purposes in Roy
!NDERSSONS lLMS n ! 0IGEON 3AT ON A "RANCH 2EmECTING ON %XISTENCE
2728: You, the Living.)
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
69
Figures 3538.#HARACTERSBOXEDINGLASSCASESIN2OY!NDERSSONSlLMSn
36: You, the Livingn!0IGEON3ATONA"RANCH2EmECTINGON%XISTENCE).
Figures 3940. A motif taken from Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Hunters in the
Snow (1565): birds looking down on humans: a double diorama, boxing in both
the birdsANDTHEHUMANSASWAXWORKlGURES in Anderssons A Pigeon Sat on a
"RANCH2EmECTINGON%XISTENCE
70
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"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
71
Figures 4950. The emphasis on being in the frame in Hoggs Unrelated and
Archipelago.
Figures 5154. 4HE lGURE OF THE EAVESDROPPER IN (OGGS Unrelated and
Archipelago.
72
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"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
73
74
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Figures 7778. Andrei Rublevs Troitsa (142527) and the last tableau in Police,
Adjective. A theatre of the abstract: reality traded in for entries in a dictionary.
"ETWEEN!BSORPTION!BSTRACTIONAND%XHIBITION)NmECTIONS
75
Figures 7982. Liquidity vs. dry structure: Joanna Hoggs picturesque and
sensuous outdoor scenes in Archipelago and Unrelated.
76
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Figures 8588. Corneliu Porumboius 7HEN %VENING &ALLS ON "UCHAREST OR
Metabolism: variations on dialogues and prolonged tableau shots.
Figures 8990. Folding over the body and the house in Exhibition.