Bill Etra

This is a documentary about video artists Bill & Louise Etra, Woody & Steina Vasulka, and Kit Fitzgerald & John Sanborn.

While performers Frankie and Annette are going new wave and even punk, they find out that the old tunes and attitudes are not completely washed away.

A tortuous journey, in the company of the Spanish painter Salvador Dalí, around the figure of the enigmatic and visionary French poet Raymond Roussel (1877-1933).

Reclined underneath a bedsheet, Louise Etra reads an excerpt from chapter 3 of Legman's "Oragenitalism: Oral Techniques of Gential Excitation". Visual effects done on the Rutt-Etra synthesizer.

Two protest rallies against the Vietnam War that took place in May 1970: the Hard Hat Riot on Wall Street in New York City and Kent State/Cambodia Incursion Protest in Washington, D.C.

A narrative self-discovery theme done in real time in Art Nouveau style.

"Video by Bill Etra, early to mid 1970s, perhaps at the WNET TV Lab?"

"Video by Bill Etra, early to mid 1970s, perhaps at the WNET TV Lab?"

An early work by Bill & Louise Etra, with Peter Crown. Made with biotelemetry equipment and video synthesizer at the TV Lab, WNET, NYC.

Computer/ video interface piece by Bill and Louise Etra with Dr. Lou Katz.

Avalon is a real-time animation made to demonstrate the possibilities of Bill Etra's prototype digital video synthesizer that he, at the time, called "The New Machine". Set to Django Reinhardt's "Avalon".

Reclined underneath a bedsheet, Louise Etra reads an excerpt from chapter 3 of Legman's "Oragenitalism: Oral Techniques of Gential Excitation". Visual effects done on the Rutt-Etra synthesizer.

Set to Holst's Mars, the Bringer of War, Bill Etra's original performance on 9 B&W monitors was shot in real-time on 16mm color film by Woody Vasulka. The 16mm film added some unexpected and welcome color effects that lend themselves to the composition and the choice was made to leave them in.

Bill Etra's "Abstractions on a Bedsheet" was made with the Rutt/Etra Video Synthesizer under PDP11-10 computer control. Bill said that the climax took as long as the rest of the piece to compose and program.

"A substantial late work by Bill Etra". A "fast version" also exists.

Made by Bill and Louise Etra with the Rutt/Etra Video Synthesizer in 1974. "A short piece of Gothic horror."

An early work by Bill and Louise Etra.