UC Santa Barbara UC Santa Barbara Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title Unstill Life: The Emergence and Evolution of Time-Lapse Photography Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/2q89f608 Author Boman, James Stephan Publication Date 2019 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Santa Barbara Unstill Life: The Emergence and Evolution of Time-Lapse Photography A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Film and Media Studies by James Stephan Boman Committee in charge: Professor Janet Walker, Chair Professor Charles Wolfe Professor Peter Bloom Professor Colin Gardner September 2019 The dissertation of James Stephan Boman is approved. ___________________________________________________ Peter Bloom ___________________________________________________ Charles Wolfe ___________________________________________________ Colin Gardner ___________________________________________________ Janet Walker, Committee Chair March 2019 Unstill Life: The Emergence and Evolution of Time-Lapse Photography Copyright © 2019 By James Stephan Boman iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my friends and colleagues at UC Santa Barbara, including the fellow members of my cohort—Alex Champlin, Wesley Jacks, Jennifer Hessler, and Thong Winh—as well as Rachel Fabian, with whom I shared work during our prospectus seminar. I would also like to acknowledge the diverse and outstanding faculty members with whom I had the pleasure to work as a student at UCSB, including Lisa Parks, Michael Curtin, Greg Siegel, and the rest of the faculty. Anna Brusutti was also very important to my development as a teacher. Ross Melnick has been a source of unflagging encouragement and a fount of advice in my evolution within and beyond graduate school. Even since my first week in Santa Barbara, Connie Penley has been a scholarly inspiration, a true friend, and a model of pedagogical generosity. I am grateful to the wonderful department staff, whose knowledge and warmth made my progress through the program much easier than it otherwise would have been. I would also like to acknowledge the various cafes, bakeries, and coffee shops in which this dissertation was researched and written, and to express my gratitude for good coffee, inviting ambience, and friendly and patient employees. These include Café Luna (RIP) in Summerland, California; Café Plume, Café Internationale, and especially Hof Kelsten in Montreal, Quebec; and Café Leila and Romeo’s Coffee in Berkeley, California. I am deeply grateful for the insights and advice of each of my committee members, and for the generally sane, supportive, and smooth functioning of the committee as a whole. The basis of this dissertation began in two seminars taught by Chuck Wolfe. His leadership of those seminars, and the spirit of open dialogue that he fostered, were instrumental in my iv beginning to take seriously the idea that a dissertation might be written on the subject of time-lapse photography. Peter Bloom has been a unique interlocutor throughout, and an incredibly supportive advocate as I have gradually made a home for myself in academia, and Colin Gardner added fascinating insights and suggestions. Finally, Janet Walker has been everything I needed in an advisor, and I cannot say enough about her support for this project and for me as a scholar and as a human being. One of the great gifts of my time at USCB is undoubtedly the friendships I have gained. These include Hannah Goodwin, with whose research my own has many significant affinities, and with whom I have been very lucky to exchange work in progress. Steve Malcic, whose enthusiasm for movies and intelligence about teaching always make him a source of great conversation. And Greg Burris, who has played various roles in the evolution of this project, from neighbor, to distraction, to sounding board, political provocateur, and role model. Lastly, whatever satisfaction I feel in academic work, and whatever quality that work aspires to, is bound up with the companionship of Tess McClernon. Tess has long been a willing and incisive reader and, along with our animal companions, Luis and Sass, she has been my home base, intellectual proving ground, and emotional safety net throughout these years. This dissertation is for her. v VITA OF STEPHAN BOMAN 2019 EDUCATION Ph.D., Film and Media Studies, 2019 University of California, Santa Barbara M.A., Cinema Studies, 2011 San Francisco State University B.S., Mathematics, 2004 The University of Chicago SCHOLARLY PUBLICATIONS Journal Articles and Book Chapters “‘A Grave of Pure White Snow’: The Documentary Sublime, Environmental Aesthetics, and The Epic of Everest,” ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment 25, no. 4 (2018): 809-834. “In the Flesh: Balázs, Brakhage, and the Anatomy of Filmic Gesture,” forthcoming in Discourse: Journal for Theoretical Studies in Media and Culture. “A Portrait of the Artist as Automaton: Creativity, Labor, and Technology in Tim’s Vermeer,” in Documenting the Visual Arts, ed. Roger Hallas (forthcoming, under contract with Routledge). Manuscripts in Preparation “Replaying the Film of Life: Fossils, Photographs, and other Icons of Evolutionary Time” CONFERENCE ACTIVITIES Conference Panels Organized 2017 “Visualizing Deep Time,” Co-Chaired with Hannah Goodwin; Respondent, Brooke Belisle. Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Chicago, IL, March 22-26. vi Conference Papers Presented 2019 “Warning the Future: Deep Time, Environmental Media, and the Representation of Nuclear Waste,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Seattle, WA, March 13-17. 2018 “Circadian Cities: Biology, Analogy, and Time-Lapse Imagery in Hilary Harris’s Organism,” Visible Evidence XXV, Bloomington, IN, August 8-11. 2018 “Of Potted Plants and Crackpot Science: Photography, Psychophysics, and The Secret Life of Plants,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Toronto, ON, March 14-18. 2017 “Ecstatic Affinities: Photographs, Fossils, and the Weave of Evolutionary Time,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Chicago, IL, March 22-26. 2016 “Between Visualization and Activism: Arthur C. Pillsbury, Time-Lapse Photography, and the Conservationist Ethic,” Visible Evidence XXIII, Bozeman, MT, August 11- 14. “Drawing Distinctions: The Art and Automatisms of Tim’s Vermeer,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Atlanta, GA, March 30-April 3. 2015 “‘A Grave of Pure White Snow’: Framing Nature and Narrating Death in The Summit and The Epic of Everest,” Visible Evidence XXII, Toronto, Canada, August 19-23. “Morbid Arts: Photography, Film Theory, and the Mediation of Death,” annual conference of the Film Studies Association of Canada, Ottawa, ON, June 2-4. “The Matter of Life and Death: Filmic Mediation in The Act of Seeing with one’s own eyes,” “Encounters” graduate student conference, department of Film and Media Studies, UC Santa Barbara, April 2-3. “Vital Signs: Sensation, Abstraction, and the Invention of Time-Lapse Photography,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Montreal, QC, March 25-29. “Big Bang: Creation, Time-Lapse, and the Exploding Image,” “SHOCK VALUE: Experience, Affect, and the Moving Image” graduate student conference, department of Cinema Studies, New York University, February 20-21. 2014 “The World Without Us: Art, Automatism, and Time-Lapse Photography,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Seattle, WA, March 19-23. 2013 “Muteness and Eloquence: Narrating American Landscape in Four Experimental Documentaries,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Chicago, IL, March 6-10. vii 2012 “Bodies in Evidence: Art, Death, and Document in Stan Brakhage’s Autopsy Film,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Boston, MA, March 21-25. 2010 “Images of the Past: Sir Arne’s Treasure and the Historical Sublime,” graduate student conference, department of Cinema Studies, San Francisco State University, Oct 20-22. 2009 “Subjectivity, Knowledge, and Metaphor in Roman Polanski’s Chinatown,” English Graduate Council’s Regional Fall Symposium, CSU Chico, November 19. FELLOWSHIPS AND AWARDS 2015-2016 Graduate Humanities Research Fellowship, UCSB TEACHING EXPERIENCE Teaching Experience: Primary Instructor (Responsible for syllabus, lectures, office hours, managing teaching assistants, and grading) 2015 Animals in Film and Visual Culture, UCSB (Summer). 2014 Introduction to Cinema, UCSB (Summer). Guest Lectures: 2014 “American Avant-Garde Film in the 1960s,” International Film History, UCSB (Spring). 2013 “Experimental Cinema in the 1960s,” International Film History, UCSB (Spring) Teaching Experience: Teaching Assistant (Responsible for leading discussion sections, holding office hours, and grading) 2014 International Film History: New Waves and Beyond, UCSB (Spring). Classical Film Theory, UCSB (Winter). 2013 Introduction to Cinema, UCSB (Fall). Advanced Film Analysis, UCSB (Summer). International Film History: New Waves and Beyond, UCSB (Spring). Media Criticism, UCSB (Winter). 2012 History of Electronic Media: Telegraphy to Early Television, UCSB (Fall). viii 2011 Writing About Cinema, SFSU (Spring). 2010 Critical Studies, SFSU (Fall). Writing About Cinema, SFSU (Fall). Documentary Film, SFSU (Spring). 2009 Genre—Horror, SFSU (Fall). ASSOCIATION MEMBERSHIPS: 2014-present Film Studies Association of Canada 2011-present Society for Cinema and Media Studies LANGUAGE SKILLS: Native Speaker of English Advanced French (reading and spoken) RESEARCH INTERESTS: Early