Man Ray (born Emanuel Radnitzky, 1890-1976) was an American visual artist who spent most of his career in Paris. his work spanned the visual arts and he was best known for his photography although he considered himself a painter. He was a major contributor to the Dada and Surrealist schools of art and forged friendships with Marcel Duchamp and Max Ernst, and photographed such luminaries as Picasso, Dali, James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, and Peggy Guggenheim. His work was displayed in exhibitions with Jean Arp, Joan miro, Picasso, and Ernst. He was named one of the 25 most influential artists of the 20th Century, and was specifically cited for "his explorations of film, painting, sculpture, collage, assemblage and prototypes of what would eventually be called performance art and conceptual art."
In the 1920s he made a number of significant short avante-garde films. Les Mysteres du Chateau du De (The Mysteries of the Chateau of Dice) was a twenty-seven minute film which had Ray and a number of his friends visit a chateau for to days. All the characters were masked. They play dice, exercise, play by a pool, dance, and play dice again. The gardens are exquisite, the surroundings expensive, the details strange and surreal. A mannequin's hand holds the dice Don't look for a plot.
It helps to know that dice were a symbol of the Dada movement.
It should also be noted that, although the film was twenty-seven minutes long, all copies seem to run twenty minutes with no indication of any cuts in the film. It is likely that the film was made at a different speed than the copies run.
Enjoy. Or be confused. Your choice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6bSygUuU9o
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