Filmmaker Lewis Klahr “re-animates” images from mid-twentieth-century advertisements, comic books, and other popular talismans of American popular culture to produce unique narratives. He’s been making films since 1977 and is known for his idiosyncratic experimental films and cutout animations which have been screened extensively in the United States and Europe.
New York’s Museum of Modern Art has purchased Klahr’s films for their permanent collection, and curated three one-person shows with him since 1989. Klahr has also been included in the Biennial Exhibition of the Whitney Museum of American Art (1991 and 1995). His epic cutout animation The Pharaoh’s Belt received a special citation for experimental work from the National Society of Film Critics in 1994.
For the past three years Klahr’s shorts (Altair, Lulu and Pony Glass) have been included in the New York Film Festival. Below you can watch all three including Pony Glass, which is a comic book/vintage ad mashup starring Jimmy Olsen and Altair, one of Klahr’s masterpieces, an 8 minute collage color -noir culled from late-40’s pages of Cosmopolitan, which induces a sense of claustrophobia and dread through its use of Stravinsky’s The Firebird”. After which you can watch my personal favorite titled Lulu. Enjoy.
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