Ephemeral Cinema Spaces: Stories of Reinvention, Resistance and Community

Description

With changing technologies and social habits, the communal cinema experience would seem to be a legacy from another era. However, the 2010s saw a surge in interest for screening films in other temporary public settings. This desire to turn ruins, pubs, galleries, parks, village halls, and even boats into ephemeral cinema spaces is a search for ways of being and working together, using cinema as a framework for social encounter. This book documents contemporary practices of pop-up and sitespecific cinema exhibition in the UK (with a focus on Scotland), tracing their links with historical forms of non-theatrical exhibition such as public hall cinema and fairground bioscopes. Through archival research, observation and interviews with film exhibitors and programmers, the book explores how exhibitors create ephemeral social spaces, how they negotiate the various uses and configurations of films and venues, and how they reinvent cinemagoing from its margins. Cover Table of Contents Introduction The structure of the book 1. Unstable constellations: Recognizing cinema out of place 1.1. Configurations 1.2. Protocols 1.3. Conclusion 2. Relocations: Mapping the non-theatrical field in Scotland 2.1. The fieldwork sample 2.2. Non-theatrical 2.3. Ephemeral 2.4. Pop-up 2.5. Improvised and insterstitial 2.6. Early ephemeral cinemas 2.7. Conclusion 3. A desire for the civic: Community cinemas and volunteer work 3.1. Social value 3.2. Public hall cinema 3.3. Community cinema 3.4. Case studies 3.5. Conclusion 4. Film clubs and subcultural cinephile spaces 4.1. Film cultures 4.2. Alternative exhibition in Glasgow 4.3. Glasgow film clubs 4.4. Producing spaces of cinephilia 4.5. Negotiating abundance and obsolescence 4.6. Conclusion 5. On the ground: Participatory screenings in everyday spaces 5.1. Archive film and local audiences 5.2. Spaces for action 5.3. Pop-up cinema as a site for public discussion 5.4. Conclusion 6. Crafting the extraordinary: site-specificity and liveness 6.1. An unrepeatable experience 6.2. Enhanced cinema: the pleasures of space 6.3. Site-specific programming 6.4. Expanded and expansionist cinema 6.5. Liveness 6.6. Conclusion 7. Against enclosure: DIY exhibition as prefigurative action 7.1. Tactical urbanism 7.2. Publicness and commoning 7.3. DIY and disalienated work 7.4. Home Cinema 7.5. Networks 7.6. Conclusion Coda Acknowledgements About the author Bibliography Index List of figures Figure 1: Locations of screenings attended in Scotland Figure 2: Age of films screened at Scottish community cinemas, 2016-2017 season Figure 3: Dalry Town Hall Cinema. Linocut print by Marta Adamowicz, 2019 Figure 4: The Old Hairdressers, Glasgow. Linocut print by Marta Adamowicz, 2019 Figure 5: Radical Film Archive at the Laurieston Arches, Glasgow. Linocut print byMarta Adamowicz,2019 Figure 6: Pollywood at Pollokshields Playhouse, Glasgow. Linocut print by Marta Adamowicz, 2019 Figure 7: Cinemor77 yurt cinema. Linocut print by Marta Adamowicz, 2019 Figure 8: The Peccadillo houseboat, a Radical Home Cinema venue. Linocut print by MartaAdamowicz, 2019