INTERVIEW WITH STUDENTS (NO SOUND) AND DISPLAY OF STUDENT WORK
Unedited fragments

by Laszlo MOHOLY-NAGY
1943 / 16mm / color / silent / 1S / 3' 40

The film skims along close-up head shots of seven day and evening students. It then shows a disassembled bent plywood armchair. Various student projects are presented, including chess pieces made of transparent plastic, posters, a four-part lamp design, a radio design, abstract photography, flexible sculptures of wood, the head shot of a student, objects too dark to be identifiable and a chess set of clear plastic inspired by a design from the German Bauhaus.

There is a close head shot of a student enjoying chicken that was cooked in an infra-red oven. Two chickens are shown cooking in the oven.

A man looks at a two-piece hanging sculpture of clear plastic by László Moholy-Nagy.

A group of students and their instructor set up a large camera to photograph an abstract sculpture. A large camera is used for portrait photography.

Close head shots of two students.

NOTES ON FIVE SHORT UNEDITED FILM FRAGMENTS ABOUT THE SCHOOL OF DESIGN IN CHICAGO

Between 1940 and 1944, László Moholy-Nagy shot a number of short movies that documented the activities and projects of the design school he directed. The school had been founded in Chicago in 1937 as the New Bauhaus: American School of Design, but it was closed after only one year. In 1939 Moholy-Nagy founded another school, the School of Design in Chicago, which was reorganized and renamed the Institute of Design in 1944. In 1956 the Institute of Design became a department of the Illinois Institute of Technology, where it continues today.

Five original films have survived. They are unedited, leftover footage that Moholy-Nagy used to produce a longer film called Design Workshops in 1944, which showcased the operation of the recently renamed Institute of Design. All of Moholy-Nagy’s movies about the school were shot on 16 mm Kodachrome film. The films are silent and without intertitles.

The original film footage, as well as other important documents, are preserved in the (Elmer) Ray Pearson Institute of Design Collection of the Chicago History Museum, formerly the Chicago Historical Society. The titles and dates were probably added by Pearson.

– Hattula Moholy-Nagy, 15 April 2024

1 PRINT IN DISTRIBUTION


distribution format Digital file on server (FHD)
screen 16/9 (single screen)
speed 29,976 fps
sound silent
rental fee 29,00 €