On 29 March, from 13:30 hrs until 22:00 hrs, If I Can’t Dance and van Oldenborgh present Cinema – this, Television – that, with contributions by Jean Fisher, Ruth Noack, Sven Lütticken and Snejanka Mihaylova at the Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam. This one day conference is an integral part of the research and production for van Oldenborgh’s new work, which has been commissioned by If I Can’t Dance.

Through a programme of lectures, screenings, conversations and a live script reading, Cinema – this, Television – that thinks through ideas of temporal simultaneity, shared authorship, acting and being. How are production and performance articulated in cinema and in television? Can television as a supposedly ‘democratic medium’ successfully open up space for different voices in the public sphere? Jean-Luc Godard’s film Número Deux forms a point of departure. In this film Godard and his wife Anne-Marie Miéville first articulated their thoughts on television and video, making them an integral part of the film. They wrote about the relation between cinema and television: “A: In a cinema people are many (together) to be alone in front of the screen. B: In an apartment linked to an TV aerial people are alone to the many (together) in front of the screen.”

Following a screening of Número Deux, Ruth Noack and Wendelien van Oldenborgh offer for discussion issues raised by the film about production, agency and authorship. Sven Lütticken considers what makes up the properties of a televisual performance. Jean Fisher speaks about setting and the inclusion of the audience in a video installation by James Coleman. Snejanka Mihaylova muses on theatricality in the visual arts. A live script reading at the end of the day turns the conference floor into a site for rehearsal and production.

Cinema – this, Television – that is If I Can’t Dance and van Oldenborgh’s contribution to the conference-festival Cinema Clash Continuum. This week-long festival on film and history in the age of Godard takes place from 28 March – 1 April at the Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam.