The Korsakow System

Chronic alcoholism and experimental filmmaking - how do they go together?The answer is fascinating: about 10 years ago, Florian Thalhofer was finishing his Master's thesis at the University of the Arts in Berlin. He was working on a project that references alcohol and the Korsakow Syndrome, a condition in which people lose their short-term memory, sometimes due to chronic alcoholism. He found that folks suffering from the syndrome interesting because they tend to re-tell the world repeatedly through stories, and in a manner that's nonlinear. He decided to create his thesis in a similar, nonlinear way, and began work on a software application that would make the most of repetitions and digressions. With support from the Amsterdam-based arts organization Mediamatic, he created the Korsakow System, a free application to help others make similar projects.

Korsakow projects are database projects that function through tagging. Rather than arranging a series of video clips to make a linear story, Korsakow users instead give keyword tags to the clips, which appear in a multi-window interface, generally with one large image at the top, which plays; underneath are three related clips, from which the viewer chooses. In this way, the video unfolds based on the tagging system and through the viewer's sequence of choices.Matt Soar, from the Concordia-based group called CINER-G, recently worked with Thalhofer and a team of programmers to rewrite the application in Java, and while the new version retains all of the functionality of the original Korsakow System, it adds new options for lay-out and design. It is also browser-based, meaning that people can share interactive experiences online. Korsakow in this new version is a powerful platform for collaborations, too. Korsakow makes interactive authoring accessible for those of us who have no experience as programmers.

I think documentary filmmaking needs to pay attention to new media applications like the Korsakow System. This idea was underscored by the Visible Evidence documentary conference that took place at USC over the weekend, wrapping up this afternoon. One of the highlights of the conference was a Korsakow Workshop led by Matt Soar on Sunday, which introduced participants to the program. But it's difficult for traditional documentary filmmakers to relinquish control - if you are used to telling a clear story, how do you let go of the strict coherence of your argument, and let meaning be determined in part by user choice and in part by chance? What are the ethical implications? Can these projects be as effective? And will users know how to make sense of the information? As social media habits continue to influence our culture, these questions are increasingly significant, and I think there's great potential in thinking beyond the linear, but without letting go of ethics or a kind of rigor. These things just need to be re-thought a bit.

Take a look at Matt's project about Montreal's skyline, Almost Architecture, to get a sense of the possibilities. And download the free application here. And if you come up with an interesting nonlinear project, let me know!
Image: from Matt's Almost Architecture project, showing the basic Korsakow interface.