Approaching Epstein - Photogénie & Lyrosophie
Thoughts On: Concepts of Jean Epstein: On Certain Characteristics of Photogénie (1926) and The Lyrosophy (1922)
A look at two key ideas of Jean Epstein.
So often, I find film criticism rather tedious and reading other theorists' writing a bit of a task. There are a rare few critics/theorists that I can read and enjoy; Jean Epstein is one of these writers. French silent filmmaker, a key figure in the so-called Impressionist movement of the 20s, Epstein developed an approach to cinema that had focus on the place and character of the camera. Expressionists focused on their sets, Constructivists, their cutting. The Impressionists developed an entirely internal form of language, one that consciously sought to bring out the soul of that which found itself in the cinematic space. It was such a soul that was intended to be impressed upon the audience.
In conjuncture with his films is Epstein's writing (primarily that from the 20s), his most famous idea being photogénie, after that, lyrosophie. Photogénie was not an idea unique, nor original, to Epstein. Alas, it is his description of the phenomena in, for example, On Certain Characteristics of Photogénie, that is so impactful:
What Epstein articulates with his idea of photogénie concerns the life and death of imagery. As the common saying goes, an image, a photograph, captures life. If we ponder upon this for a moment, however, we must come to accept that not all images have 'life' in them per se. Only certain photographs can capture the life in, say, someone's eyes. Following this logic, we cannot suggest that images come to life when played at 24 frames per second. It is only when photographs that truly manage to capture life begin to move at 24 fps do we come to a heightened, truly life-capturing form of cinema. This is what Epstein described with photogénie: only certain blocks of images could exude moral being, a soul, via filmic reproduction:
To follow this logic fully, one must also come to grips with lyrosophie - which, admittedly, isn't nearly as well defined by Epstein (at least in the works that I have read) as photogénie. The tension in much of Epstein's writing--whether it be on photogenie, lyrosophie or any number of other things--emerges from a question of truth that is lost between the real of the subjective and objective. One of Epstein's key essays, La Lyrosophie, then speaks much about science and the place of scientific evidence in art:
Epstein's affirmations here are overwhelmingly expressive. While he does not reject scientific truth, he asks what occurs when scientific and subjective truth meet. He then suggests elsewhere in his essay that 'even if the experiment fails, you still believe that hydrogen can combine with chlorine'. With this we can recognise that, whilst Epstein seemingly exists on the edge of a philosophy of pure relativism - each individual having their own perception dictating the nature of truth (which is itself inevitably malleable and subject to subjectivity) - there is a more complex network of ideas at work. Relativism has a tendency to destroy all notions of absolute truth. Epstein disrupts and then relocates absolute truth. We then may have a scientific truth at hand: hydrogen can combine with chlorine. Subjective experience, an experiment conducted in our kitchen, may imply that hydrogen cannot combine with chlorine. In face of this subjective experience, one would not readily declare that scientific truth has failed; rather, the experiment failed. (Further testing would ensue at this point). So, whilst subjective truth may not destroy scientific truth, for Epstein, scientific truth isn't necessary absolute truth. Absolute truth emerges only when perceptual truth aligns with scientific truth; there must be some kind of resonance between the subjective and the objective for truth to be felt, to be received as truly true. This phenomena is termed lyrosophy by Epstein; lyro meaning lyric, sophy meaning knowledge. This is when 'science enters a lyrical state' and we feel reason, sense logic and experience knowledge. Let us then look again at this:
Science is dead until it is brought to life via investigation. This animating process would involve a scientist seeing a flower bloom, studying it, and then learning how to describe the process: cause discovered through a study of effects. The life that comes out of such a scientific approach would concern something such as the beauty or eloquence of an equation or of realisation. Art follows an entirely different path of mimesis. An artist would then aim to present the beauty of a flower's existence in a way reveals the complexity of the fact that it is blooming. Here art has a transcendent life that reveals mechanisms in reality. The difference between art and science is not necessarily qualitative; the beauty of poetry and an equation need not be compared. What is of interest is the function of fantasy and imagination. When knowledge falls into fantasy or imagination or when fantasy and imagining reveals knowledge, there emerges lyrosophy. Lyrosophy can come from science, but Epstein suggests that science dies before lyrosophy emerges. On the other hand, lyrosophy seems to be an inherent quality of what Epstein considers art.
If we combine our rudimentary understanding of both photogénie and lyrosophie, we can begin understand some of Epstein's major contributions to film theory. Epstein dealt with cinema as a window towards something lofty and absolute; it was a mechanism that transcended reality, allowing the objective visions of the world to merge with the subjective processings of humanity via poetry (creation). Artistic cinema, the cinema Epstein seemingly loved, existed in a lyrosophical mode. It allowed greater truth to emerge from the collision of objective material and subjective perception. The result of this collision is a feeling of great profundity, it is the ecstatic experience of knowledge itself. The process by which this occurs is described by the phenomena of photogénie. Photogenic images are those which bring the objectiveness of imagery to life, open up reality and materiality to something transcendent, something estimating moral being and personality. Photogénie then becomes a wormhole through the realm of lyrosophy; the experience of art is the movement through the lyrosophic space via the path of photogénie.
Such concludes our brief look at a filmmaker who wrote from love, a love of cinema and experiencing film, a theorist, one of the few who tried to express why we should all love film with seriousness and conviction. I end by turning to you. Have you read anything by Jean Epstein? How would you summarise some of his work and what are your thoughts on all we've covered today?
If you are interested in reading more from Epstein, the book collecting his work that I am reading through can be found here.
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End Of The Week Shorts #79
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The Ontology Of The Photographic Image - Realism
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amazon.com/author/danielslack
A look at two key ideas of Jean Epstein.
So often, I find film criticism rather tedious and reading other theorists' writing a bit of a task. There are a rare few critics/theorists that I can read and enjoy; Jean Epstein is one of these writers. French silent filmmaker, a key figure in the so-called Impressionist movement of the 20s, Epstein developed an approach to cinema that had focus on the place and character of the camera. Expressionists focused on their sets, Constructivists, their cutting. The Impressionists developed an entirely internal form of language, one that consciously sought to bring out the soul of that which found itself in the cinematic space. It was such a soul that was intended to be impressed upon the audience.
In conjuncture with his films is Epstein's writing (primarily that from the 20s), his most famous idea being photogénie, after that, lyrosophie. Photogénie was not an idea unique, nor original, to Epstein. Alas, it is his description of the phenomena in, for example, On Certain Characteristics of Photogénie, that is so impactful:
What is photogénie? I would describe as photogenic any aspect of things, beings or souls whose moral character is enhanced by filmic reproduction. And any aspect not enhanced by filmic reproduction is not photogenic, plays no part in the art of cinema.
What Epstein articulates with his idea of photogénie concerns the life and death of imagery. As the common saying goes, an image, a photograph, captures life. If we ponder upon this for a moment, however, we must come to accept that not all images have 'life' in them per se. Only certain photographs can capture the life in, say, someone's eyes. Following this logic, we cannot suggest that images come to life when played at 24 frames per second. It is only when photographs that truly manage to capture life begin to move at 24 fps do we come to a heightened, truly life-capturing form of cinema. This is what Epstein described with photogénie: only certain blocks of images could exude moral being, a soul, via filmic reproduction:
Cinema thus grants to the most frozen appearances of things and beings the greatest gift in the face of death: life. And it confers this life in its highest guise: personality.
To follow this logic fully, one must also come to grips with lyrosophie - which, admittedly, isn't nearly as well defined by Epstein (at least in the works that I have read) as photogénie. The tension in much of Epstein's writing--whether it be on photogenie, lyrosophie or any number of other things--emerges from a question of truth that is lost between the real of the subjective and objective. One of Epstein's key essays, La Lyrosophie, then speaks much about science and the place of scientific evidence in art:
... while science demonstrates, feeling is itself the essence of the demonstration, that is to say, the pure affirmative. And if it does not succeed in being this complete affirmation, it is but an absurdity, a nullity. Science progresses; feeling is immediately everything or nothing.
The knowledge of feeling is a passion. Lyricism takes sides with everything and nothing of what it knows and leaves it indifferent, for as soon as there is knowledge in a lyrical state, instantly this knowledge is perfect - that is, it becomes love, passion, possession, and self-forgetting. Science looks for causes through the study of effects. Lyricism creates causes in proportion to effect, that is, it invents them.
Epstein's affirmations here are overwhelmingly expressive. While he does not reject scientific truth, he asks what occurs when scientific and subjective truth meet. He then suggests elsewhere in his essay that 'even if the experiment fails, you still believe that hydrogen can combine with chlorine'. With this we can recognise that, whilst Epstein seemingly exists on the edge of a philosophy of pure relativism - each individual having their own perception dictating the nature of truth (which is itself inevitably malleable and subject to subjectivity) - there is a more complex network of ideas at work. Relativism has a tendency to destroy all notions of absolute truth. Epstein disrupts and then relocates absolute truth. We then may have a scientific truth at hand: hydrogen can combine with chlorine. Subjective experience, an experiment conducted in our kitchen, may imply that hydrogen cannot combine with chlorine. In face of this subjective experience, one would not readily declare that scientific truth has failed; rather, the experiment failed. (Further testing would ensue at this point). So, whilst subjective truth may not destroy scientific truth, for Epstein, scientific truth isn't necessary absolute truth. Absolute truth emerges only when perceptual truth aligns with scientific truth; there must be some kind of resonance between the subjective and the objective for truth to be felt, to be received as truly true. This phenomena is termed lyrosophy by Epstein; lyro meaning lyric, sophy meaning knowledge. This is when 'science enters a lyrical state' and we feel reason, sense logic and experience knowledge. Let us then look again at this:
Science looks for causes through the study of effects. Lyricism creates causes in proportion to effect, that is, it invents them.
Science is dead until it is brought to life via investigation. This animating process would involve a scientist seeing a flower bloom, studying it, and then learning how to describe the process: cause discovered through a study of effects. The life that comes out of such a scientific approach would concern something such as the beauty or eloquence of an equation or of realisation. Art follows an entirely different path of mimesis. An artist would then aim to present the beauty of a flower's existence in a way reveals the complexity of the fact that it is blooming. Here art has a transcendent life that reveals mechanisms in reality. The difference between art and science is not necessarily qualitative; the beauty of poetry and an equation need not be compared. What is of interest is the function of fantasy and imagination. When knowledge falls into fantasy or imagination or when fantasy and imagining reveals knowledge, there emerges lyrosophy. Lyrosophy can come from science, but Epstein suggests that science dies before lyrosophy emerges. On the other hand, lyrosophy seems to be an inherent quality of what Epstein considers art.
If we combine our rudimentary understanding of both photogénie and lyrosophie, we can begin understand some of Epstein's major contributions to film theory. Epstein dealt with cinema as a window towards something lofty and absolute; it was a mechanism that transcended reality, allowing the objective visions of the world to merge with the subjective processings of humanity via poetry (creation). Artistic cinema, the cinema Epstein seemingly loved, existed in a lyrosophical mode. It allowed greater truth to emerge from the collision of objective material and subjective perception. The result of this collision is a feeling of great profundity, it is the ecstatic experience of knowledge itself. The process by which this occurs is described by the phenomena of photogénie. Photogenic images are those which bring the objectiveness of imagery to life, open up reality and materiality to something transcendent, something estimating moral being and personality. Photogénie then becomes a wormhole through the realm of lyrosophy; the experience of art is the movement through the lyrosophic space via the path of photogénie.
Such concludes our brief look at a filmmaker who wrote from love, a love of cinema and experiencing film, a theorist, one of the few who tried to express why we should all love film with seriousness and conviction. I end by turning to you. Have you read anything by Jean Epstein? How would you summarise some of his work and what are your thoughts on all we've covered today?
If you are interested in reading more from Epstein, the book collecting his work that I am reading through can be found here.
Previous post:
End Of The Week Shorts #79
Next post:
The Ontology Of The Photographic Image - Realism
More from me:
amazon.com/author/danielslack
