Chris Langdon is a Los Angeles-based artist who produced a large body of work in many media, including painting, sculpture, graphics, assemblage, photography, film, and video.

While attending California Institute of the Arts

California Institute of the Arts

The California Institute of the Arts, commonly referred to as CalArts, is located in Valencia, in Los Angeles County, California. It was incorporated in 1961 as the first degree-granting institution of higher learning in the United States created specifically for students of both the visual and the...

 from 1971-76 in the Film (BFA) and Art (MFA) schools, Chris was extremely prolific, in particular producing about forty 16mm and 35mm films, in addition to assisting artists Robert Nelson

Robert Nelson

Robert Nelson was an Anglo-Quebecer physician and a leading figure in the Lower Canada Rebellion in 19th century Quebec ....

, John Baldessari

John Baldessari

John Anthony Baldessari is an American conceptual artist known for his work featuring found photography and appropriated images. He lives and works in Santa Monica and Venice, California...

, and Jack Goldstein

Jack Goldstein

Jack Goldstein was a Canadian born, California-based performance and conceptual artist turned painter in the 1980s art boom.-Early life and education:...

 in the production of some of their films.

Chris's film work was influenced by, but also satirized tendencies in the Los Angeles art world toward conceptual and structural work. Most of her film work makes extensive use of lively and unexpected humor and employs the tropes of so-called "low" culture, including corny references and pulp media, to make biting critiques and comments on (and devilish subversions of) the ways in which we ingest images, and what our minds then do with them. For instance, the film Bondage Boy (1973) uses an absurd and unlikely bondage setup as a satire on structuralism, while a phony post-mortem documentary on Picasso (Picasso (1973)) allows us to question the authority of images. This is the Brain of Otis Crawfield (1973) could be seen as a damning statement on both the Anglo co-opting of African-American culture and humanity, as well as a send-up of superficial "emotional" pieces that use clichéd cinematic tricks to manipulate audience reaction. Another film, Love Hospital Trailer (ca.1975) presents a series of goofy romantic and pseudo-professional interludes among its all-male cast in the guise of a soap opera TV spot.

Chris ended a long initial string of filmmaking in about 1976, and retired (?) from making art in 1994. In 2008, she resumed painting.

Partial filmography

All films are 16mm unless noted. Several films are lost, a handful of which are not listed here due to lack of information.

• Go Oh Wow (1972, color, sound, 6min.)
• My Girdle My God (ca.1972, color, sound, 15min., never shown)
• Bondage Boy (1973, color, sound, 5.5min.)
• Bondage Girl (1973, color, sound, 6min.) (aka Immaculate Gate)
• Now, You Can Do Anything (made with Fred Worden
  Fred Worden
  Fred Worden, filmmaker, has been involved in experimental cinema since the 1970s. His work has been screened at The Museum of Modern Art, in the 2002 Whitney Biennial, The Centre Pompidou, in Paris, The Pacific Film Archive, The New York Film Festival, The London Film Festival, The Rotterdam...
  
  , 1973, color, sound, 5.5min.)
• Picasso (April 8, 1973, b/w, sound, 3min.)
• The Gypsy Cried (1973, b/w, sound, 3min.)
• This is the Brain of Otis Crawfield (1973, b/w, sound, 4min.)
• Two Faces Have I (1973, b/w, sound, 3min.)
• Venusville (made with Fred Worden
  Fred Worden
  Fred Worden, filmmaker, has been involved in experimental cinema since the 1970s. His work has been screened at The Museum of Modern Art, in the 2002 Whitney Biennial, The Centre Pompidou, in Paris, The Pacific Film Archive, The New York Film Festival, The London Film Festival, The Rotterdam...
  
  , 1973, color, sound, 10min.)
• Intermittent Transposition (ca.1973-4, color, sound, 6min.)
• Fun (ca.1974, b/w, sound, ca.18min., currently lost)
• 999 BOY (1974, b/w, sound, 10min.) (aka Express Implication)
• My Laser (ca.1974, color, sound, 5min.)
• The Surf Caster’s Story (ca.1974, b/w, sound, 4min.)
• Thin Premises (1974, color, sound, 5min.) (aka I’ve Seen Hundreds of Movies 2, 5, 10, 20 Times or More as Long as This, Based on Thinner Premises)
• Swimming Pool (ca.1974, ca.30min. – currently lost, no other info known)
• Choppers (ca. 1975, 35mm, color)
• Go Cart (1975, b/w, sound, 3min.)
• Interview With an Artist (ca.1975, b/w, sound, 14min.) (aka Mitch Speaks)
• The Last Interview With P. Passolini (1975, b/w, sound, 6min.)
• Love Hospital Trailer (ca.1975, color, sound, 3min.)

External links

• http://www.redcat.org/event/chris-langdon
• http://kcet.org/local/blogs/blur_sharpen/2009/12/spring-forward-redcat-2010.html
• http://conversationsattheedge.org/?p=3208
• http://preservationinsanity.blogspot.com/2009/05/ephemeral-sculpture.html