Video synthesizer

Open­ing this Thursday at the Film Archive at 5:30pm, an exhib­i­tion by 92-year old Wel­ling­ton paint­er, sculptor, artist Michael Nich­olson.

If that’s not impress­ive enough this work, The Michael Nich­olson Visu­al Music Pro­ject: Stage 3. Op.s 1–4, was ori­gin­ally cre­ated on a “Scan­im­ate” machine in Aus­tralia in the 1980s; the same machine that early Star Wars, Ses­ame St and The Elec­tric Com­pany anim­a­tions were made on. Nich­olson worked with the Film Archive to restore the ori­gin­al U‑matic tapes and edited them togeth­er as ‘Visu­al Music’ with the assist­ance of edit­or Diane McAl­len.

Michael Nich­olson first came to New Zea­l­and in the 1950s to work at the Elam School of Fine Art. His latest work is inspired by the abstract expres­sion­ist paint­ings of Wassily Kand­in­sky. It’s hyp­not­ic, fas­cin­at­ingly beau­ti­ful and on dis­play for the next month in the Pelor­us Trust mediagal­lery.

This event launches an Exper­i­ment­al Film Fest­iv­al too but more about that soon!

Still images: Screen grabs from The Michael Nich­olson Visu­al Music Pro­ject: Stage 3. Op.s 1–4