Ricercar

Summary

The film consists of two long, smooth tracking shots through a building. Slowly the camera moves through the hallways and rooms. In one of the rooms, the cellist France Marie Uitti is playing.

The two long camera movements are superimposed on each other as a dual image, so that the second image is centred over the first. Because the second image is smaller, we can still see, at the edges of the frame, the first camera movement, as a kind of counterpoint to the centre image that attracts our attention.

Kölgen obtained this effect by having the film run through the camera twice, so that, with the aid of masks; first the one tracking shot was filmed, and only then the second, and still unexposed tracking shot.

The result is a smooth choreography whereby both images eventually blend into a glaringly white, overexposed image.