Peter Hutton: Two Rivers + In Titan's Goblet

Presented by Mount Analogue ○ Art + Cinema

Two films by Peter Hutton, described as “one of cinema’s most ardent and poetic portraitists of city and landscape,” projected in their original 16mm format. Two Rivers (2003, 47 min.) presents contemplative, observational portraits of the Hudson and the Yangtze rivers. In Titan’s Goblet (1991, 10 min), takes its title from the Hudson River landscape painting by Thomas Cole, and inscribes ever-so-subtle patterns and movements of sky, sun, moon, and fire.

Two films by Peter Hutton (1944-2016), described as “one of cinema’s most ardent and poetic portraitists of city and landscape”, projected in their original 16mm format. Two Rivers presents contemplative, observational portraits of the Hudson and the Yangtze rivers. Preceded by In Titan’s Goblet filmed in the Hudson River Valley and inspired by Thomas Cole’s landscape painting.

Two Rivers (2003, 47 min., 16mm, silent) was inspired by Henry Hudson’s failed 1609 quest to discover a trade route between North America and China. Hutton observes the bustling industry of the Hudson from atop a ship’s deck and through monocular portholes and hawsepipes before his panorama opens onto the quietude of the wooded palisades farther north. He then explores the Three Gorges area of the Yangtze River as it unfolds like a Chinese scroll painting, bearing witness to a spectral, sulfurous landscape of factory villages that have since been flooded by China’s monumental hydroelectric dam project.

Preceded by
In Titan’s Goblet (1991, 10 min., 16mm, silent) Taking its title from a surreal Hudson River landscape painting by Thomas Cole circa 1833, In Titan’s Goblet inscribes ever-so-subtle patterns and movements of sky, sun, moon, and fire. Day becomes night, and night day, as the dawn’s first light glimmers over a dark copse of trees, fleecy clouds pass like ice floes across the moon’s bright orb, and a bulldozer plows its way across an infernal valley of burning tires.

“Peter Hutton is one of cinema’s most ardent and poetic portraitists of city and landscape. Whether seeking remembrance of a city’s fading past or reflecting on nature’s fugitive atmospheric effects, Hutton sculpts with time. Each of his films unfolds in silent reverie, with a series of extended single shots taken from a fixed position, harking back to cinema’s origins and to traditions of painting and still photography … reveal(ing) an artist dedicated to reawakening a more contemplative and spontaneous way of observing and envisioning the world.”—Josh Siegel, MoMA