In 2005, Chicago media artist Ben Russell initiated an inquiry into the alchemy of cinema, trance, travel and psychedelic ethnography. This inquiry has since conjured seven films, collectively known as the Trypps series. The first gestures in Trypps Number One were cameraless and focused on manipulating the essential elements of cinema: light and dark. By Trypps Number Three, Russell was directing the cinematographic apparatus on the collective transcendence of a concert by Rhode Island noise band Lighting Bolt. Immersed in the deep chiaroscuro and soft focus of the throbbing spotlit audience, Russell draws out the deeply corporeal and metaphysical embodiment of this contemporary youth ritual. The adaptation of trance ritual within hybrid culture lead to Trypps #6 (Malobi). Structures of ethnographic spectatorship are negotiated, and the body of the filmmaker folds into the cinematographic process. Trypps #7 (Badlands) fully indulges the semiotics of the moving image. The perception of a woman’s LSD trip in Badlands National Park is suspended between the gullies and horizons of the desert landscape. “Concerned with notions of the romantic sublime, phenomenological experience, and secular spiritualism, the work continues Russell’s unique investigation into the possibilities of cinema as a site for transcendence” (Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago).

Ben Russell: www.dimeshow.com

Black and White Trypps Number One
USA 2005. B&W, 16mm, silent. 6 mins.
Black and White Trypps Number Two
USA 2006. B&W, 16mm, silent. 9 mins.
Black and White Trypps Number Three
USA 2007. Colour, 35mm, sound. 12 mins.
Black and White Trypps Number Four
USA 2008. B&W, 16mm, sound. 11 mins.
Trypps #5 (Dubai)
USA-Dubai 2008. Colour, 16mm, silent. 3 mins.
Trypps #6 (Malobi)
USA-Suriname 2009. Colour, 16mm, sound. 12 mins.
Trypps #7 (Badlands)
USA 2010. Colour, Super 16mm on HD, sound. 10 mins.
Black and White Gods
USA 2008. B&W, dual 16mm live performance with sound. 20 mins.

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