Jeff Scher

Whiplash

During the years preceeding his death, Sonbert channeled his energy into making Whiplash. His vision and motor skills impaired, he gave his companion, Ascension Serrano, detailed instructions about the assembly of specific shots and the music to be used as a counterpoint to the images. Before his death in 1995, he asked filmmaker Jeff Scher (a former student of Sonbert's at Bard) to complete the film. --Jon Gartenberg. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with Estate Project for Artists with AIDS in 1996.

Prisoners of Inertia

Indecisive newlyweds get into a series of misadventures while on a day trip from Manhattan to Hoboken, New Jersey.

A Walk Into the Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory

Esther Robinson's portrait of her uncle Danny Williams, Warhol's onetime lover, collaborator and filmmaker in his own right, offers a exploration of the Factory era, an homage to Williams's talent, a journey of family discovery and a compelling inquiry into Williams's mysterious disappearance at age 27.

Trigger Happy

“Trigger Happy” was made with hundreds of objects found on the streets and sidewalks of New York. It began as an attempt to make an animated ballet, but as I was shooting the dance turned rowdy, into more of a nocturnal revel. It was shot on a lightbox with high-contrast film. The backlight silhouetted the objects, making them into graphic icons of themselves. The resulting film is a negative, which turned the objects white and the background black as asphalt. It makes the dance almost phantasmagoric. The trigger I was happy about was on the camera, but the title also fits the velocity of the imagery. Much of the animation happens by the rapid replacement of one object with another. It’s the afterimage in your eyes that animates the difference between the shapes, as one is replaced by another, and another… The music by Shay Lynch perfectly captures the idea of dancing in the streets.” —Jeffrey Noyes Scher

Yours

An animated short film created by the artist Jeff Scher.

Warren

In Warren, Scher turns the table on his former teacher and mentor, creating an intimate dialogue between friends as well as a battle of directorial wills, at a moment when Scher recognized that Sonbert was becoming ill.

Reasons to Be Glad

I made this film while experimenting with a home made rotoscope. It was drawn on index cards. It's a sort of valentine to film, to life and to Xavier Cugat too. The original 16mm negative was lost when my lab at the time closed suddenly. Boy, I don't miss film at all. (JS)

Milk of Amnesia

A six minute short made in New York City by Jeffrey Noyes Scher.

Whiplash

During the years preceeding his death, Sonbert channeled his energy into making Whiplash. His vision and motor skills impaired, he gave his companion, Ascension Serrano, detailed instructions about the assembly of specific shots and the music to be used as a counterpoint to the images. Before his death in 1995, he asked filmmaker Jeff Scher (a former student of Sonbert's at Bard) to complete the film. --Jon Gartenberg. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with Estate Project for Artists with AIDS in 1996.

Prisoners of Inertia

Indecisive newlyweds get into a series of misadventures while on a day trip from Manhattan to Hoboken, New Jersey.

A Walk Into the Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory

Esther Robinson's portrait of her uncle Danny Williams, Warhol's onetime lover, collaborator and filmmaker in his own right, offers a exploration of the Factory era, an homage to Williams's talent, a journey of family discovery and a compelling inquiry into Williams's mysterious disappearance at age 27.

Trigger Happy

“Trigger Happy” was made with hundreds of objects found on the streets and sidewalks of New York. It began as an attempt to make an animated ballet, but as I was shooting the dance turned rowdy, into more of a nocturnal revel. It was shot on a lightbox with high-contrast film. The backlight silhouetted the objects, making them into graphic icons of themselves. The resulting film is a negative, which turned the objects white and the background black as asphalt. It makes the dance almost phantasmagoric. The trigger I was happy about was on the camera, but the title also fits the velocity of the imagery. Much of the animation happens by the rapid replacement of one object with another. It’s the afterimage in your eyes that animates the difference between the shapes, as one is replaced by another, and another… The music by Shay Lynch perfectly captures the idea of dancing in the streets.” —Jeffrey Noyes Scher

Yours

An animated short film created by the artist Jeff Scher.

Warren

In Warren, Scher turns the table on his former teacher and mentor, creating an intimate dialogue between friends as well as a battle of directorial wills, at a moment when Scher recognized that Sonbert was becoming ill.

Reasons to Be Glad

I made this film while experimenting with a home made rotoscope. It was drawn on index cards. It's a sort of valentine to film, to life and to Xavier Cugat too. The original 16mm negative was lost when my lab at the time closed suddenly. Boy, I don't miss film at all. (JS)

Milk of Amnesia

A six minute short made in New York City by Jeffrey Noyes Scher.

Graham Nash: Dirty Little Secret

The Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 is retold in song and animation.

Ashtray Ballet

"I made this in 1975 while in college. It was my anti smoking response to Oskar Fischinger's cigarette commercials. It was aired a few times on PBS." –Jeff Scher

Spin Cycle

A short animation featuring a spinning slice of bread by Jeff Scher with music by Shay Lynch.

Tunnel Vision

Jeff Scher's 2013 ode to underground public transport.

Area Striata

The film is a film of Japanese traditional fabric stencil in a non-repeating single frame pattern.

The Shadow's Dream

Tulips

The kiss is particularly interesting to me, as it’s one of the best things we all get to do, yet almost everyone does it with their eyes closed.

The Artist in Me

A short documentary following 19-year-old Amanda Dunbar, who shares her thoughts on being an artist alongside a group of children in her art class. This documentary is included as a special feature on the 2002 Barbie as Rapunzel DVD.

Crazy Walk

Jeff Scher's short animation, first released in 2020.

White Out

In short, it's a film about winter. And to create it, Jeff Scher composed approximately 2,250 watercolor paintings on paper. Each one is elegant and beautiful in itself, depicting classic snowy scenes, but when composited together, we see incredible movement and fluidity revealed as cold memories bleed into one another.

Bang Bang

Bang Bang was an experiment in animating positive and negative Rorschach-like bilaterally symmetrical ink blots. It is at heart a flicker film, where black-and-white images are smacked on the screen in rapid intervals in pursuit of afterimage effects. It is best viewed wide-eyed focusing on the center of the screen.

Eztli

The watercolor-painted animated short depicts an Ancient Aztec human sacrifice.

L'Eau Life

NYC

Scher made this in 1976 as a student at Bard College. He printed it to negative years later and liked the way it looked better than the now faded original film.

blood keys

Soundtrack: American Royalty

Kodachrome Love Poem

American Playhouse

American Playhouse is an anthology television series periodically broadcast by Public Broadcasting Service in the United States.