Box-A-Rama

A psychedelic hallmark of early Vancouver experimental cinema. The collage of shapes and textures shot in the back alleys of the downtown east side is set against the found footage of nuclear annihilation.

"Brion Gysin and Ian Sommerville innovated a machine they called 'Flicker' which produces similar effects to what Sam was filming with me. The other footage is of me with a large pair of scissors, cutting up verbal material from magazines. I was working on collaging text and pictorial material onto a large, fascinating chair owned by Bill Bissett." -Gary Lee-Nova

"There were also explorations of what Sam called 'Sun Strobes.' This is a process of directly looking at the sun with closed eyes and then spreading the fingers of both hands extended fully in front of the face and then moved up and down. This has a strobing effect for the sunlight landing on the eyelids and creates sets of interesting visual patterns for the closed eyes. With 16mm cameras, Sam and I went to the Nitobe Garden. It was late Spring or early Summer of 1965. Sam filmed me engaging plant forms like green leaves and holding them up to my eyes and observing the visible structures of the leaves." -Gary Lee-Nova