Referents, context and strategies for database open media works.

Digital audio-visual databases combined with interactive multimedia presentation techniques offer an alternative communications model to the authoritarian structures of the cinematic tradition. This alternative model implies a radical redefinition of the methods of conception, production, analysis, distribution, and consumption of audiovisual messages. More importantly, these redefined processes permit an open communications (creation and viewing) environment in which the power relationships involved in the construction of meaning are multidirectional and multidimensional.

Cinema, the foremost industrial art form to emerge from advanced capitalism [2] , began to reveal its dependency on spacio-temporal linearity and perceptual control at the very same time that, inspired by a changing vision of the world [3], artists in most other disciplines were attempting to liberate their activities from these same structures. By the time the medium was 10 years old representational Aristotelian narrative and authoritative creative voice almost completely dominated cinematic expression. This was nothing but the dialectical product of the material specificity of the medium; its demand for spatial and temporal fixity exacted a set of conventionalized technological, procedural, and creative structures [4]. Author, work, and viewer all rapidly came to be defined by a very narrow set of power relationships.

"...a medium is not innocuous, it doesn't wait for somebody to use it to define its direction; which, in one way or another, is part of its essence from the moment it exists. It's existence, beyond the application which it may later receive, has been determined by the characteristics of who produced it and the corresponding ideology, interests, sensibilities. These will in some way, sooner or later, influence the possibilities of usage." (Getino 1984: 113)

While there is a long tradition of experimental film artists breaking conceptually with the linearity of the medium, most of their efforts concentrated on the aesthetic elements rather than the structural conditions. These artists produced many important works of art but did not transcend the established politics of creation. In the mid-1960's the authoritarian specificity of the medium became clear to third world filmmakers working outside of the colonial, capitalist establishment. In Latin America filmmakers such as Garcia Espinosa [5] of Cuba, the members of Cine Liberacion [6] of Argentina and the members of Grupo Ukamau [7] of Bolivia, proposed a different vision(s) that attempted to alter the power factors. Their efforts focused on the following problematic aspects of cinematic communication:

The hermetism of its structures:

- Imperfect cinema is "neither self-sufficient nor contemplative" (Garcia Espinosa 1983: 31 )

Its unidirectionality:

- "This authoritarian conception which only permits for unidirectional information and the appearance of communication ..." (Getino 1984: 120)

The objectification of expression and its alienation from process:

- The peoples art is activity, elitist art is product (Garcia Espinosa 1983)
- The standardization of the mechanisms of creation and interpretation. (Solanas 1989: 87)

The passivity of the viewer:

- "Man admitted only as passive consuming object..." (Getino 1984: 120)
- "The main issue is whether there is a set of emerging conditions for these spectators to become authors" (Garcia Espinosa 1984: 30)

This movement, mostly referred to as Third Cinema, resulted in an important critical discourse which for the first time presented a non-hegemonic international dialogue about the political condition and aesthetic specificity of cinema. But, given the lack of alternative audiovisual vehicles, the creative dialectical response to these issues was limited to the conceptual and procedural, and as Michael Chanan puts it, "the emergence of new styles" (Chanon 1983: 2). None of the key structural questions could be addressed within the strict material limitations of an analogue temporal medium.

The digital has since arisen as a new materiality for audiovisual construction. Database audiovisual communication, by the very nature of the structures it employs to store, organize, compose and present information, appears to be a creative environment capable of addressing these concerns. Yet, given the highly abstract nature of the digital and its ongoing trans-formative evolution, it is challenging to understand these capabilities, to unveil the historical referents, and to develop corresponding creative strategies.

One model to guide the exploration of these challenges can be found in modern art, which has tangibly addressed the same preoccupations expressed by the Third Cinema regarding the authoritarian structures involved in the construction of cinematic meaning. In Julio Garcia Espinosa's words:

"A large part of the struggle waged in modern art has been, in fact, to 'democratize' art. What other goal is entailed in combating the limitations of taste, museum art, and the demarcation lines between the creator and the public? What is considered beauty today and where is it found? Even the eternal value of a work of art is today being questioned. What else could be the meaning of those sculptures, seen in recent exhibitions, made of blocks of ice which melt away while the public looks at them? Isn't this - more than the disappearance of art - the attempt to make the spectator disappear? Don't those painters who entrust a portion of the execution of their work to just anyone, rather than to their disciples, exhibit an eagerness to jump over the barricades of 'elitist' art? Doesn't the same attitude exist among composers whose works allow their performers ample liberty? There is a widespread tendency in modern art to make the spectator participate ever more fully." (Garcia Espinosa 1983: 30)

Richard Lanham also sees in modern art a solid background for exploring the significance of digital art when he points at: "...the extraordinary fact that the visual arts have, once again miraculously imagined an expressive explosion before it took place, before digital electronic means made it possible". (Lanham 1994: 1958)

The triangulation among modern art, Third Cinema, and digital database structures could provide a new model of creation for those searching for a pluralistic, process driven, truly interactive audiovisual medium. This triangle composed of the aspirations of the modern art movements and revolutionary cinema as its base and the possibilities of database art as its apex can serve as the foundation for what Humberto Eco calls 'open work' environment. This environment "offers a transcendental scheme that allows the participant to comprehend new aspects of the world." "...it offers the participant an infinite potential for exchange rich in unforeseeable discoveries". (Jennings 1996: 347)

Freeing the parts: breaking with perfection [8]

Much of the focus of 20th century art has involved a constant search for flexible materials and methods of creation in which the constituent elements of expression are empowered as independent modules of interacting meanings. Wassily Kandinsky developed a system of modular visual foundational elements to which he assigned expressive values. Each of these elements could independently be qualified by using secondary aesthetic properties. The recombinant possibilities of such a system both liberated Kandinsky from the linearity of representational space and released new expressive forces to the creator and interpretative forces to the viewer. These "vital forces" emerge from each element's "inner nature". (Holtzman 1996) Kandinsky’s genius was to understand that the whole is not necessarily greater than the sum of the parts, but that this relationship between interpretative units and the whole is far more multi-polar and multi-directional. This exploration of the essential constituent components of expression, the structural condition of meaning, and the intrinsic forces of composition is also a key drive in the emergence of artistic movements such as serialism, suprematism, dada and techniques like collage and assemblage.

In cinema, the strictness of the temporal flow and rigidity of the spatial condition, constrain both the author and the viewer to a fixed position in reference to the progressive construction of the whole. No other art form restricts the perception of time and space as narrowly as the cinema. Once this position is assumed each moment, each image, each sound are only relevant as part of the sequence. The whole becomes the defining constructive force thus limiting the independent relevance of the parts and their recombinant interdependencies.

In computer-based expression the essence of the components is not physical but purely mathematical with no intrinsic spatial or temporal state. Database media structures empower the constituent elements by defining, conditioning, and valuing them independently of each other. Each may contain a multiplicity of qualifying definitions which at once identify them as unique and enable latent relationships. Adapting Ricki Goldman-Segal's terminology I will call the group of constituent components brought together by a distinct creative impulse a "constellation". (Goldman-Segal 1995) Just like astronomical constellations or Kandinsky's paintings, elements in a database are brought together by conceptual/interpretative relationships. Database constellations embrace discontinuity and lack narrative impulse and prescribed point of view and thus manifest the 'open work' environment. (Jennings 1996)

Representative of such an environment, "...two, three, many Guevaras", an exploratory database, undertakes the challenge of analyzing the message and relevance of Latin American revolutionary Ernesto Che Guevara through the artworks by him inspired. This constellation includes paintings, engravings, murals, posters, sculptures, poems, songs, and every other imaginable form of artistic representation. These works, originating in over thirty-three countries, amount to thousands of constituent media units. Additionally, interviews were conducted with many of the corresponding artists and other cultural workers to reveal their reasons for producing works on Che Guevara. These interviews are fragmented into independently expressive video segments. All of the artworks and the video segments constitute the constellation of "...two, three, many Guevaras".

A data-entry / indexing module is used to unify all of the media units into a common digital environment. This module permits for flexible viewing and analysis of the constellation. Besides the usual reference information (author, date, origin, etc) each media element is assigned a numerical relevance rating, (n) in table 1.1, that indicates its importance within the constellation.

After repeating viewing of the constellation, historical, contextual, aesthetic, and metaphorical interpretative modes (patterns) begin to emerge. Modes can be described as categories of meaning. As these modes solidify they are entered into a separate but related database. These interpretative multi-dimensional modes progressively serve as the central structure of meaning for the constellation. Some modes become more relevant to the interpretation of the constellation than others. Gradually modes are also given a numerical relevance rating, <n> in table 1.1.

On continuing explorations of the constellation, relevant modes are assigned to each media unit. Each individual mode assignment is given a numerical value, /n/ in table 1.1, indicating the importance of that particular mode to the interpretative condition of the media unit. This value also suggests how important the media unit is among all those described by that mode. (Table 1.1)

 

		Interpretive Modes <relevance rating>
		Mode <2>	Mode b <5>	Mode c <3>	Mode d <8>	Mode e <5>
Media Units (relevance rating)	Media A (2)	/6/	/3/	/2/
	Media B (7)	/2/				/8/
	Media C (4)		/7/	/3/		/4/
	Media D (2)	/8/			/6/
	Media E (9)		/5/		/8/
	Media F (6)		/6/	/4/		/7/

 

Table 1.1 - Media (n) , mode <n>, and assignment /n/ relevance values.

 

By now three sets of intersecting relevance values define the identity of every media unit within the constellation: its own rating (n), the rating of the modes related to it <n>, and the value of each mode assignment /n/. It must be noted that many factors, some obvious, some entirely mysterious, influence the assignment of these values.

As the piece evolves an ongoing dialogue takes place between all of these elements by which they constantly modify each other. For example the emergence of a new mode may create a set of patterns which alter the overall balance of values. This open, constant and fluid dialogue among the parts and between the parts and the whole is the foundational generative mechanism of "... two, three, many Guevaras," and, as we will see, defines its creative/viewing experience. While he couldn't have envisioned it, this approach embraces Julio Garcia Espinosa's aesthetic of imperfection, which defines artistic expression as process, and rejects cinematic consummation. (Garcia Espinosa 1983)

"But a finished work is dead work. Its evolution has stopped and it has been objectified, sometimes enveloped in the magic of its mystery or perfection. What's important, most valuable, is the process by which the work is constructed. The struggle and conflicted coexistence with it is a contest which modifies the work and modifies the creator". (Solanas 1989: 77)

Engines of meaning: breaking with authority

"Cuban cinema is not exclusively measured by the finished product. There exists a viewer-cinema relationship as there exists an author-cinema relationship. It is necessary that the cinema does not negate the author-viewer relationship." (Garcia Espinosa 1979: 30)

Tristan Tzara's chance literary composition method of picking at random from a collection of words, was not only a radical expression of the valuing of the constituent compositional element, but also a consequent next level of questioning of the internal forces involved in the creation and interpretation of art. By making chance a central generative mechanism Tzara fractures the centrality of the author's intentionality and control, and shifts the scale of creation from the individual to the environmental. By doing so the very engine (mechanisms of construction) by which constituent elements are brought together, composed, and sequenced is placed outside of the artist, thus becoming an overarching determinant in the creation-interpretation dialectic. This change of focus by which the main activity of the artist becomes the elaboration of expressive environmental conditions is also seen in such strategies of creation as aleatory techniques, game theory, stochastic processes, automatism, and ephemeral materials. This vision enabled the conditions for the emergence of performance art, installation art and ultimately the possibility of viewers’ penetration of the generative milieu.

In contrast, the cinema’s dependence on vertical control of meaning and a clearly defined set of static power relationships is revealed by the generalized lack of creative experiments in terms of conditions of viewership. The viewing act is universally and unilaterally defined as passive. This formulaic authoritarian tendency is present throughout the generative process, expressing itself in a multiplicity of tightly defined techniques and procedures. In this context, authors and viewers are terms of a temporal equation, their properties and functions permanently bounded by the physical and functional condition of the medium.

Alternatively, the Third Cinema aspired to a creative environment in which the author-viewer relationship was empowered as an interactive continuum, a complex social collaboration in the struggle to reach new levels of insight into the conditions of existence. The most successful approach involved the fractionation of the conditions of production partially permitting the viewers' penetration of the hermetic cinematic authoring space. As early as the late 1950s Fernando Birri, a pioneer of the movement, invited the subjects of his documentary Tire Die to become involved in its making. Later, Jorge Sanjines referred to the works of Grupo Ukamau as collectively made films involving popular participation in which the protagonists of history themselves cooperate in the creative act. (Sanjines 1983:34). The filmmakers of Cine Liberacion expanded this continuum to the viewing space through a temporal structure of ‘open spaces’ that permitted for the projector to be stopped at any time to allow viewers’ interventions. (Chanon 1984) Also in Argentina, the film Los Caminos de la Liberacion employed a modular construction mode that allowed for its temporal reorganization in each screening according to the needs of the venue and the viewers. (Getino 1984: 142) While these efforts opened liberating creative spaces and generated an important theoretical dialogues, they did not, could not, succeed in altering the overall suppressive direction of the medium.

Today, this conception of the creative process as an environment for interaction between a multiplicity of juxtaposing agencies finds an apt vehicle in digital databases. Some of the most interesting developments in this direction are taking place in the social sciences where investigators are developing collaborative database research environments. Describing this type of database Ricki Goldman-Segall indicates: "Unlike the traditional entertainment model, the audience is not only the recipient of the content through a given medium. As Davenport (1994) points out, a new bridge is constructed across content and tools wherein the audience interacts and contributes to the learning and building of the story". (Goldman-Segal 1995 : 31) And in regards to the social relevance of such an alternative approach Janet Murray proclaims: "The invention of a medium to support such explorations is an important task in supporting the development of the next generation of applications in the humanities" (Roy 1995).

My intention in producing "... two, three, many Guevaras " was to create an environment and a search engine which would permit each viewer/participant to construct their own interpretative paths through the database constellation. Participant activity is also a dynamic agency of environmental change as the paths intervene in the identity of the piece by constantly modifying the set of relevance values of media components and interpretative modes. These multidirectional levels of interactivity are the basis of an exploratory module/process that formally captures the universality of Guevara's message and embraces a plurality of points of departure and readings.

Participants navigate the constellation and develop their own interpretative paths by using the exploratory module. This module is composed of two navigational environments, a thumbnail gallery and a full-frame view. A participant is initially presented with the thumbnail gallery containing a set of randomly selected and randomly placed thumbnails. To navigate through the constellation the participant indicates, by touching the screen or clicking a mouse, a media unit of interest. The database interprets this input as a query for related media units and responds by utilizing a relevance-driven aleatory process:

Step 1

When a media unit is selected, its interpretative modes become active. All media units in the entire constellation containing at least one of the active modes is then defined as 'active-media'. A list of active-media is created from which the next set of media units will be selected using an occurrence probability ranking calculated from the system of relevance values.

Step 2

Each of the selection's assignment-values /n/ is multiplied by the scores of the corresponding active modes <n>. The resulting selected-mode multipliers {n} suggest the importance of any particular mode in describing that media unit within the constellation. A selected-mode multiplier is calculated for each of the modes of the selected unit. (Table 2.1)

 

		Interpretive Modes <relevance rating>					Relevance Calculations:	Probability Scale
		Mode <2>	Mode b <5>	Mode c <3>	Mode d <8>	Mode e <5>
Media Units (relevance rating)	Media A (2)	/6/	/3/	/2/
	Media B (7)	/2/				/8/
	Media C (4)		/7/ /7/ x <5> = {35}	/3/ /3/ x <3> = {9}		/4/ /4/ x <5> = {20}
	Media D (2)	/8/			/6/
	Media E (9)		/5/		/8/
	Media F (6)		/6/	/4/	/4/	/7/

 

Table 2.1 - Media C is the selected media unit. Selected-mode multipliers {n} are calculated.

 

Step 3

Each selected-mode multiplier {n} is multiplied by the assignment-value /n/ given to the shared mode for each active-media. This produces an active-mode aggregand [n] for each applicable mode of each active media. (Table 2.2)

 

		Interpretive Modes <relevance rating>					Relevance Calculations:	Probability Scale
		Mode <2>	Mode b <5>	Mode c <3>	Mode d <8>	Mode e <5>
Media Units (relevance rating)	Media A (2)	/6/	/3/ {35}x/3/= [105]	/2/ {9}x/2/= [18]
	Media B (7)	/2/				/8/ {20}x/8/ = [160]
	Media C (4)		/7/ /7/ x <5>= {35}	/3/ /3/x<3> = {9}		/4/ /4/x<5> = {20}
	Media D (2)	/8/			/6/
	Media E (9)		/5/ {35}x/5/= [175]		/8/
	Media F (6)		/6/ {35} x /6/= [210]	/4/ {9} x /4/= [36]	/4/	/7/ {20}x/7/= [140]

 

Table 2.2. Active-media aggregands [n] are calculated.

 

Step 4

If an image contains more than one active mode, the active-mode aggregands are added. This step produces a correspondence-value [[n]] that indicates the degree of interpretative correspondence of each active media to the selection unit.

Step 5

Finally, for each active media unit the correspondence-value [[n]] is multiplied by its rating (n). This last step yields the overall relevance !>n<! value for each active media. This value becomes part of a probability scale from which the next series of media units to be presented are chosen. (Table 2.3)

 

-

		Interpretive Modes <relevance rating>					Relevance Calculations:	Probability Scale
		Mode <2>	Mode b <5>	Mode c <3>	Mode d <8>	Mode e <5>	[[Correspondence value]] !>Overall Relevance<!	(percent probability)
Media Units (relevance rating)	Media A (2)	/6/	/3/ {35}x/3/= [105]	/2/ {9}x/2/= [18]			[105] + [18] = [[123]] x (2) = !>246<!	1 - 246 (4.58%)
	Media B (7)	/2/				/8/ {20}x/8/= [160]	[[160]] x (7) = !>1120<!	247 - 1366 (20.85%)
	Media C (4)		/7/ /7/ x<5>= {35}	/3/ /3/x<3>= {9}		/4/ /4/x<5>= {20}
	Media D (2)	/8/			/6/
	Media E (9)		/5/ {35}x/5/= [175]		/8/		[[175]] x (9) = !>1575<!	1367 - 2941 (29.32%)
	Media F (6)		/6/ {35}x/6/= [210]	/4/ {9}x/4/= [36]	/4/	/7/ {20}x/7/= [140]	[214]+[36]+[140] = [[390]] x (6) = !>2430<!	2942 - 5371 (45.24%)

 

Table 2.3 - Correspondence values [[n]] and overall relevance values !>n<!are calculated. Probability scale is obtained.

 

The navigation interface and search engine of "...two, three, many Guevaras" allow for great flexibility in what Richard Lanham calls the "trajectory of attention" (Lanham 1994). In the gallery environment, compound trajectories can be established by dragging one selection on top of another. The calculation process proceeds as previously described, but considering the interpretative modes of both selections. The selected-mode multipliers of any shared modes are added, in a step, which strengthens the probability of the shared mode(s) to affect the trajectory of attention.

While the most relevant media elements are most likely to succeed a viewer selection, any active media unit could actually become part of the trajectory of attention. Each set of media elements displayed in the gallery always includes a percentage chosen at random. This random strategy serves to fracture the internal logic of the piece and allow for completely unexpected interpretative relationships.

On entering the fullframe view with a double-click or -tap on any media unit, the participant alters the scale of perception by focusing attention on a sole media unit. Other navigational options are available, some of which again utilize the interpretative modes of the media unit and a relevance ranking method to determine the trajectory of attention. Upon returning to the gallery, the last media unit displayed in the fullframe view is incorporated into the previous thumbnail set. This is yet another participant driven mechanism enabling continuous dialogue among the components of the constellation and between their individual and collective identities.

A participant history records the cumulative set of selections made by the participant. A resulting set of dynamic participant-mode-values is created which affects the probability of media units to be selected for display. This structure gives the trajectory of attention a participant-determined directionality.

A collective history of participants' interactions is progressively analyzed to develop two independent selection ratios for each media unit and each interpretative mode. These collective viewing variables are then used to dynamically modify the general relevance values of both media units and modes. In other words the very essence of the work is permanently redefined by viewer intervention.

The relevance-driven aleatory process of "...two, three, many Guevaras" functions in a manner that shuns the hypostosis of the trajectory of attention by enabling certain adaptive/regenerative structures which are unique to database competency.

Regeneration:

The process of audiovisual communication has largely come to be defined by the hegemonic power of cinematic construction. Author, viewer and process are objectified and to a large extent rendered passive. In this context, digital media and databases offer a new open model capable of empowering a plurality of interacting generative forces and embracing process at the very core media communication.

The social and political implications of the potential shared cultural spaces and dialogues to emerge from this open environment entail a paradigm shift. Modern art, with its conceptual and aesthetic experiments, and the Third Cinema, with its ideological and structural concerns are two [9] important referents to guide the exploration of this new medium and its revolutionary potential.

Paraphrasing Fernando Solanas:

"In conclusion, a work of art must be the result of an open conception (approach). In my understanding, we must also open the process, open the script. The characters and the scenes open to new paths, and open to the impulses of the spectators. The work is never finished" (Solanas 1989 : 1977).

Notes:

1. The author wishes to acknowledge the very important contributions of Dara Meredith Gelof to both "...two, three, many Guevaras" and to this article.

2. No other mode of communications had ever required of the capitalist industrial/technological model for its very existence. While both printing and photography had both greatly utilized technology neither was essentially dependant on it.

3. Important new scientific and social theories were simultaneously transforming our conception of reality and history. Concepts such as evolution, the unconscious, dialectical materialism, and relativity were emerging as a new philosophical paradigm.

4. These conventions include physical aspects of the medium such as the establishment of a standard film width (35mm) and film speed (18 and later 24 frames per second); aesthetic principles such as the rules of continuity; and production procedures such as the studio system and its division of labor.

5. Julio Garcia Espinosa, born in 1926, Cuban, filmmaker and theorist, has been a leading figure of Cuban revolutionary cinema. He has made many films: Cuba Baila, El Joven Rebelde, Aventuras de Juan Quinquin, Tercer Mundo - Tercera Guerra Mundial. Among his most important writings are: Por un cine imperfecto, En busca del cine perdido, and Una Imagen Recorre el Mundo.

6. Name by which a young group of Argentinian left-wing Peronist filmmakers called themselves. The leading members of the group were Fernando Solanas, Octavio Getino and Gerardo Vallejo. The group became internationally known by the film The Hour of the Furnaces (1968), and by the seminal essay Towards a Third Cinema (1969).

7. Bolivian filmmaking collective active during the 1960's and 70's which defined its films as political acts rather than works of art. Among their productions are: Ukamau (1966), Sangre de Condor (1969), El Coraje del Pueblo (1971)

8. The concept of perfection utilized here refers to Julio Garcia Espinosa’s 1967 article "For an Imperfect Cinema".

9. Particularly important among other possible referents are non-western art traditions.

References:

Chanon, Michael. "Introduction." In Michael Chanon, ed. Twenty-five Years of the New Latin American Cinema. London: British Film Institute and Channel Four Television, 1983, 2-8.

Garcia Espinosa, Julio. 1983. "For an Imperfect Cinema", in M. Chanon (ed.) Twenty-five Years of the New Latin American Cinema, London: British Film Institute and Channel Four Television, 1983, 28-33.

Garcia Espinosa, Julio. "En Busca del Cine Perdido." In Una Imagen Recorre el Mundo. La Habana: Editorial Letras Cubanas, 1979, 29-33.

Getino, Octavio. 1984. "Algunas observaciones sobre el concepto del Tercer Cine", in O. Getino Notas sobre cine Argentino y Latinoamericano Mexico: Edimedios, pp. 113-142.

Goldman-Segal, Ricki. "Deconstructing the Humpty Dumpty Myth: Putting It Together to Create Cultural Meaning." In Edward Barrett and Marie Redmond, eds. Contextual Media: Multimedia and Interpretation. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1995, 27-52.

Holtzman, Stephen R. Digital Mantras: The Languages of Abstract and Virtual Worlds. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1996.

Jennings, Pamela. "Narrative Structures for New Media, towards a new definition", Leonardo (Vol. 29, No.5, 1996) pp. 345-350.

Lanham, Richard A. "The Implications of Electronic Information for the Sociology of Knowledge", Leonardo (Vol. 27, No.2, 1994) pp. 155-163

Roy, Michael. "How to Do Things Without Words: The Multicultural Promise of Multimedia." In Edward Barrett and Marie Redmond, eds. Contextual Media: Multimedia and Interpretation. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1995, 53-62.

Sanjins, Jorge. "Problems of Form and Content in Revolutionary Cinema." In Michael Chanon, ed. Twenty-five Years of the New Latin American Cinema. London: British Film Institute and Channel Four Television, 1983, 34-38.

Schumann, Peter B. Historia del Cine Latinoamericano. Buenos Aires: Editorial Legasa, 1987.

Solanas, Fernando. 1989. "La Mirada: Reflexiones Sobre el Cine y Cultura". Buenos Aires: Puntosur

Solanas, Fernando and Getino, Octavio. "Toward a Third Cinema." In Michael Chanon, ed. Twenty-five Years of the New Latin American Cinema. London: British Film Institute and Channel Four Television, 1983, 17-27.