Troy, New York-based printmaker, animator and musician Nathan Meltz presents a 30-minute stop-motion animation composed entirely of screenprint positives, ink and clay, scored live by a four-piece ensemble, exploring colonisation, violence, resistance and peace-making across three parts.
The Golem is a creature from Jewish mythology: a figure made of clay and sorcery, summoned in 16th-century Prague to protect persecuted Jews from harm. Nathan Meltz has been asking what a 21st-century Golem would look like, who it would protect, and where it would manifest. The Golem Trilogy is the answer so far.
The 30-minute stop-motion animation is composed entirely of screenprint positives, ink and clay. Collaged robotic humanoids and animals move through a sci-fi environment built from expressionistic, moody graphics and elements of experimental film, telling a story in three parts about colonisation, violence, resistance and peace-making. There is no dialogue.
“I asked, ‘Does this work without dialogue and just images?'” Meltz says. “What I really liked was that it was a pretty powerful story without words.” The story is blunt by design. “I’m not a very complicated individual; I like a straightforward story. Sometimes I can be very didactic with an idea I want to get across.”
Individual components of the trilogy have screened internationally, including the Hallucinea Film Festival in Paris, the 24Frame Future Film Fest in Bologna, the T-Short Film Festival in Karlsruhe, the Electric Dreams Festival in Milan and PBS-WMHT’s Upstate New York Independent Film Series. The Golem Smashes All Walls received a Special Jury Mention at the Electric Dreams Festival. When presented in full, the trilogy is scored live by a four-piece ensemble: lap-steel guitarist Steve Hammond, bassist Adam Elabd of the Arabic improvisational project Abu Zeyn, guitarist Mark Wolfe and Meltz on drums and percussion.
“I feel like most of my favourite artists respond to the world around them,” Meltz says, “and this is the weird way that I decide to do so.”
Nathan Meltz is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of the Arts at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, working across printmaking, animation, sculpture and performance to comment on the infiltration of technology into politics, food, family and war.
Website: nathanmeltz.com Instagram: @nathan_meltz
The Golem Trilogy. 30-minute stop-motion animation, screenprint positives, ink and clay. Live scoring ensemble: Steve Hammond, Adam Elabd, Mark Wolfe, Nathan Meltz.
