Towards the Development of a Cinema Cavern or the Movie Goer as Spelunker

Robert Smithson
1971
Pencil and collage on paper
12 5/8 x 15 5/8 in. (32.1 x 39.7 cm)

Another proposal that never came to realization, Smithson’s Towards the Development of a Cinema Cavern or the Movie Goer as Spelunker ​attempts to redeem the typical film-viewing experience. Smithson’s outlook on modern cinema is decidedly bleak: one relinquishes reality, gives into lethargy of both body and mind, and is engulfed in a blur of perception. Smithson proposes an experience grounded in the physical reality of the surrounding space, with a film that documents the creation of that very space. In a discussion with Andy Warhol, Smithson admits the proposition is ultimately flawed—the film would be a catalogue of past events, projecting a theoretical future, all of which is divorced from the present moment wherein the film would be seen.

Writing

Writing by the Artist

A Cinematic Atopia

Robert Smithson

Going to the cinema results in an immobilization of the body. Not much gets in the way of one’s perception. All one can do is look and listen. One forgets where one is sitting. The luminous screen spreads a murky light throughout the darkness. Making a film is one thing, viewing a film another. Impassive, mute, still the viewer sits. The outside world fades as the eyes probe the screen. Does it matter what film one is watching? Perhaps. One thing all films have in common is the power to take perception elsewhere. As I write this, I’m trying to remember a film I liked, or even one I didn’t like. My memory becomes a wilderness of elsewheres. How, in such a condition, can I write about film? I don’t know. I could know. But I would rather not know. Instead, I will allow the elsewheres to reconstruct themselves as a tangled mass.

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