Skip to Content

Check out The Seventh Art, an independently produced video magazine about cinema

We would like to bring your attention to The Seventh Art, an independently produced video magazine about cinema based out of Toronto, Canada. Each issue features a profile on an interesting aspect of the industry, a video essay and a long-form, and a casual interview with a filmmaker. Their first issue recently launched and features a profile on distributor filmswelike (with Ron Mann) and an 80-minute interview with director Guy Maddin (My Winnipeg, Keyhole). I don’t recall ever coming across a video style magazine before, but honestly I think it is a brilliant idea.

I’ve embedded a section of the magazine’s first entry below, but you can view the entire issue at http://www.theseventhart.org.

[vsw id=”jUDr9SvzXSs&feature” source=”youtube” width=”500″ height=”425″ autoplay=”no”]

Here is how the magazine was described in their ABOUT section:

The Seventh Art is an independently produced video magazine about cinema with three sections: a profile on an interesting group/company/organization in the industry, a video essay and a long-form interview with a filmmaker set in a casual environment.

The magazine is based equally on the rich history of writing on cinema and French television shows about cinema, such as Cinéastes de notre temps. The video format allows us to seek ways to differentiate The Seventh Art from the former, while building on the latter through the lack of time or content limitations afforded by the internet. Conventional wisdom tells that internet users are looking for extremely short content, but we believe the value of this medium exists in the abolishment of assumptions of how users engage with content. Our sections err on the longer side because they are like a magazine, which you can pick up and put down at your leisure – never requiring that you consume all sections, or even each section in its entirety in one sitting.

With this video magazine format we strive to explore cinema in a manner that is at once accessible and in-depth as we pursue questions of film form/aesthetic that link back with the initial theorization of cinema as the seventh art – regardless of how unfortunately self-justifying this initial discourse had to be. We ask not only what is cinema, but when is cinema, where is cinema, how is cinema and why cinema, especially as media converges on new distribution models that are hopefully reflected in the cross-platform nature of our ‘magazine’.

The production is based out of Toronto, Canada and is presented in a deliberately unpolished state, eschewing the extensive editing and performative sheen of video programs on cinema that prioritize these elements above the discussion of cinema and the moving image broadly.

 

[wpchatai]