The Paper Cinema: a laterna magica for 2015

The Paper Cinema makes live art that takes the concept “live” literally. With paper, a camera, and a projector, they create staggeringly beautiful tableaux in Odyssey.

All the basic materials are neatly arranged on a table: a substantial collection of handcrafted black and white figures, hand-drawn landscapes, and cut-out little people. Everything is made of cardboard or thin paper. Two artists carefully pick up the objects and manipulate them directly in front of the camera. Occasionally they also add drawings or paintings. On a large projection screen, this creates an image, then a scene, and ultimately a real-time narrative film. Three musicians also occupy the centre of the stage. They provide live sound effects and music to the film. We hear piano, acoustic guitar, and violin, but also a musical saw, toys, and numerous wondrous sounds produced with other implements.

Since 2004, The Paper Cinema has been creating this kind of high-risk audio-visual live art that is very difficult to perform. They are now bringing Odyssey, their latest wordless performance, based on Homer’s famous epic poem, to Brussels. Although there is no text and the aesthetic feels basic or lo-fi, the viewer again has a unique experience that is extremely charming. The Paper Cinema has a laterna magica that can captivate audiences in 2015. “The work is an immense challenge to perform,” says pianist Hazel Mills. “Especially for us: summarising this voluminous work for our medium – wordless live cinema and music – was very difficult. If you leave out all the complications, the Odyssey is basically about love and family values. These are perennially relevant themes with which large audiences can identify. We think that’s important.”

Why do you want to make live film and share your techniques with the audience?
Hazel Mills: We purposefully choose purely visual productions with a strong musical element. Without a language barrier we can in principle perform anywhere in the world. A journalist recently compared our method to watching a film and its making-of simultaneously. Audiences get more enthusiastic because they can see the performance from the inside. It also forces us to improvise, which makes every performance unique. On the other hand, this diversity elicits diverse reactions. Initially, people are usually completely sucked in and children watch open-mouthed. Afterwards the audience is often deeply moved. Sometimes, like at a recent performance in Georgia, the audience is highly amused. We got the whole room roaring with laughter.

(© Danny Ardionio)

This production dates from 2012 and toured extensively in England and internationally. What will the future bring?
Mills: It continues to be an extremely popular show that a lot of people want to see. Because the current performers have been touring with it for so long, however, we are training a new group of artists and musicians to take up the project in the future. That will give our group the space to experiment and thus hopefully to come up with a new production. There are still a lot of stories to tell, even with paper and a camera.

THE PAPER CINEMA’S ODYSSEY
24 > 26/3, Théâtre 140, www.theatre140.be