MEMORY AS A METHOD FOR FILMMAKING

Emilio Angel Reyes Bassail

This research develops a method for filmmaking that uses autobiographical memory as a guiding principle for the production of images. The proposed method comes as the result of a double gesture in which I wanted to a) acquire a subjective understanding of memory that came from artistic practice; and b) materialize the process of memory through film. I used the filmmaking apparatus as a technique to give visibility to the process of remembering and forgetting: I worked with strategies such as the elaboration of a “memory diary”; the drawing of spoken portraits and locations based on memories; casting techniques which involved a dialectical approach towards memory; scouting trips to find places from my memory; hypnosis sessions as a technique to recover lost memories; reenactments of memories; a method to direct actors that relied on memory as a guiding mechanism; and the editing of the footage through a process of memory associations. While doing this research, I inadvertently found that the techniques I used led to a process in which memories were rewritten through experimentation. Thus, the method produced a conceptualization of "memory" that frames it as a creative process. In the process of working on this project, I developed a very subjective approach to the craft of filmmaking that was informed by my particular relationship with memory. Thus, the proposed method of using personal memory as a core mechanism for the production of audio-visual products can be utilized as a tool for film education, promoting the creation of personal film languages based on an individual's memory, and as device to reflect on the subjective process behind an individual's artistic practice.

What is a memory? This seems like such an abstract question to me. I ́d rather start by asking, what do I remember?

Some might say that I was recording a random stream of consciousness; nevertheless, I think it was something more than that. From the experience of trying to capture a stream of memories onto paper, I can say that the process was hardly random or unguided. When starting to recall a certain moment, thousands of associations started appearing in the mind. Some scenes were so vivid that they were impossible to translate into language; some others were so blurry that there was hardly any word that could encapsulate them. At the same time, the way memories appeared in the mind was so exuberant that it was impossible for the text to keep up with the pace of the mind. It became obvious then that a lot of personal control and authority was involved in the process of remembering.

I remember a wasteland, a still life, a crocodile that lived in the hallways of a hotel. I remember carnivals dedicated to flayed saints, girls with braids by the coast…

Memory can maybe be understood not only as a mental process but as an action through which an impression of past is materialized, through which remembering and forgetting are embodied. This frame of mind allowed me, then, to follow my research into other methods in order to materialize this process. Memory at this stage was no longer something invisible.

Building this past relies on a series of decisions: I choose the words that best describe an experience or a sensation, I choose information to be recorded and information to be dismissed, I choose the beginning and the end of an idea.

From a basic structure (“My grandma cooked with a pink apron in a yellowish kitchen that looked like so and so…”), I can generate numerous images. None of these images are a true account of reality, and yet, none of them are lies. There seems to be a middle ground between reality and fiction that is occupied by memory.

continue to: Spoken portraits

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