July ’71 in San Francisco + Images of Asian Music

JULY ’71 IN SAN FRANCISCO / LIVING AT BEACH STREET / WORKING AT CANYON CINEMA / SWIMMING IN THE VALLEY OF THE MOON
Peter Hutton
16mm / 35´ / 1971 / USA

"Diary films have become a distinct genre of the independent film movement. Like a written diary, they forego the necessity of plot, character development and other attributes of a well-constructed story and concentrate simply but lovingly on the day-to-day or moment-to-moment events happening to the filmmakers. Peter Hutton’s film is, to my mind, one of the best of the genre – for it truly lets us get inside the filmmaker’s mind and sensations through, and in conjunction with, his role as filmmaker. It is almost as if we see how carrying around the camera and focusing on different people, things and events actually changes and refines the filmmaker’s normal perception of them. The camera becomes an instrument not to record reality but to expand it. And like any diary, it is both an exploration and crystallization of events and impressions in one’s life." – David Bienstock

IMAGES OF ASIAN MUSIC (A DIARY FROM LIFE 1973-1974)
Peter Hutton
16mm / 29´ / 1973 / USA

“Images of Asian Music represents footage compiled during 1973-1974 when Peter Hutton was living in Thailand and working at sea as a merchant seaman. While the film is silent, the title was intended to evoke a comparison to the movement of classical Asian music. Images of Asian Music is a personal celebration of Asia formed by a sensitivity to filmic composition and to the perception of these images in a silent time created by the filmmaker.” – Whitney Museum of American Art