Harry Bertoia (1915-1978)
Harry Bertoia's Sculpture (1965s)
Dir. Clifford B. West

From a cinemagraphic and sound perspective, this is West's most progressive film, as abstract in filmmaking technique as the sculptures themselves. Opening with the camera slowly moving over what appears to be the surface of the moon, it suddenly falls back to reveal instead the texture of a sculpture. The film is one of constant motion, resulting from the vertiginous movements of West's camera, or the movement built into the sculptures themselves. The music, played by Bertoia, utilizing various objects alternately hammering or caressing his sculptures, is reminiscent of the work of Xenakis. From the perspective of West's career, the film marked the beginning of a new, bolder approach to camera movement, as seen in later films such as Bronze: River of Metal(1972), and The Art of Rolf Nesch: Material Pictures(1972).