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| Los Caudales, 2004-05 |
"Working in the tradition of 16mm experimental cinema for the
past 25 years, Timoleon Wilkins draws unashamedly from the lyrical and
diaristic tendencies of the predecessors who have also been his teachers
(whether literally or figuratively)—particularly Brakhage, Baillie and Dorsky—and
remains fiercely loyal to the materials of “amateur” filmmaking: the Bolex,
reversal film, silent or non-sync sound. Finding beauty in unexpected places,
his work masterfully blends the sublime and the everyday, wherein subtle
observation and somber understatement exist side by side with explosions of
intense color and emotion, tracing an itinerary from clear-eyed perception to melancholy
to a kind of exaltation. Wilkins finds special inspiration in the landscape of
the West, on either side of the US/Mexico border, and his work occasionally reveals
a debt to the road movie. Above all, these films signal an artist surveying the
history and the potential of personal cinema at a time when that tradition
faces the challenge of the digital." –David Pendleton
Timoleon Wilkins received his MFA in Film, Video, Animation and New Genres from the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee in 2017.
Since 1992, he has completed more than 11 short films in 16mm and continues to work on multiple projects.
From 2007-2015 he was the manager of the Billy Wilder Theater at UCLA Film & Television Archive.
From 1997-2001 he worked for Bruce Conner and managed the film printing for the Walker Arts Center retrospective, 2000 BC: The Bruce Conner Story (2000), including the restoration of BREAKAWAY. He continues to consult for the Conner Family Trust on an occasional basis.
In the 1990s he served as president of the Board of Canyon Cinema.
