CALLY TRENCH
Films
Cally Trench's films are very short (micro or super short) animation films, some silent, some with natural or mechanical sound that she creates herself, and some with music composed by Josh Hagley. Most of her films have drawings or linocut prints as their starting point, while some use sequences of photographs. She is constantly amazed and delighted by the simple fact that if images fly past our eyes fast enough we perceive movement. Cally Trench's YouTube channel Cally is delighted that composer Josh Hagley has written music specially for eleven of her films. See Josh Hagley's website and a page about Josh Hagley on this website. |
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Burial (2022) is a very short animation film in which the entwined bones of two mermaids - mother and child - appear and disappear. The sound, reminiscent of a funeral march, was created on a bodhran and a tambourine. [1 minute 23 seconds]. Completion date 6th January 2022. "I especially enjoyed the way the music works with the images in the 'Burial' film - excellent!" (Mary Yacoob) |
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Burial was an Official Selection in the 2022 Shiver International Film Festival, with a live screening at Smiths Falls Community Theater, Smiths Falls, Ontario, Canada (25th to 26th February 2022). This was the world premiere of Burial. |
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Burial was a Finalist in the Micro Film category in 2022 in the 5th edition of 4theatre selection. |
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Burial was an Official Selection in the 2022 New Jersey International Short Film Festival, with an online screening via xerb.tv in May 2022. |
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In The Mirror (2021) is a very short animation film that considers the first hard stare we give ourselves in the morning, the stare that is only possible when there is no one else in the room: appraising, direct and unflinching. With natural sound (mechanical bird song). [43 seconds] "Another hypnotic piece with a nostalgic, relaxing quality." (Indiefilmopolis Film Festival judge) |
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In The Mirror was a Finalist in the Microshort category of the 16th edition of the Vesuvius International Film Fest, Italy, November 2021. |
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In The Mirror was an Official Selection in the Hollywood On The Tiber Film Awards, Italy, December 2021. |
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In The Mirror was was a Silver Award winner in the Super Short Film category in the Hollywood Gold Film Awards, USA, January 2022. |
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Doors (2021) is a very short animation film, with mechanical and natural sound, in which successive pairs of doors open to reveal what lies behind. [1 minute 16 seconds] "Wonderful transitions!" (Kyra Hicks) |
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Doors was an Official Selection in the Newcastle International Short Film Festival, with a live screening at The Royal Exchange Hybrid Performance Space & Cinema in Newcastle, NSW, Australia, on 12th December 2021 in the 'Indi Animation Arvo'. |
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Doors was a Category Semi-Finalist in the Alternative Film Festival (ALTFF), Toronto, Canada for Winter 2021 in two Super Short categories: Best Animation and Best Experimental International. |
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An earlier silent version of Doors was premiered in Enshrine (curated by Rekha Sameer) in Fringe Arts Bath 2019, installed in a black wooden cabinet. Gold text painted on the top of the cabinet invited visitors to: Please kneel down and look inside. The silent version of Doors was also shown in Cally Trench and Elisabetta Balasso: Original Board and Card Games at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading on 7th September 2019; and screened at Stand Up Cinema: Silent Films at the Rising Sun Arts Centre, Reading on 20th September 2019. |
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Horizontal Lines (2021) is a very short experimental animation film in which altered images flash past. Sound and images combine to create a sensation of urgency and anxiety. [26 seconds] Horizontal Lines was selected for inclusion in the Ostranenie Theatre, screened at The Plough, Farnham on 24th May 2022. An earlier silent version of Horizontal Lines was screened at the Only The Sunny Hours Film Show at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading on 23rd June 2018; shown in Cally Trench and Elisabetta Balasso: Original Board and Card Games at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading on 7th September 2019; and screened at Stand Up Cinema: Silent Films at the Rising Sun Arts Centre, Reading on 20th September 2019. It was also shown projected in Making Connections at South Hill Park, 2020. |
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Circles (2021) is a very short experimental film made up of over 200 altered photographs by the artist of circular objects - signs, plates, clock faces, etc. Humming sounds reinforce the rhythmic optical effect. [32 seconds] An early silent version of Circles was screened at the Film Night on 10th November 2017 during Lost & Found (curated by Mervyn Diese) at the Hundred Years Gallery, London. A second silent version of Circles was screened at the Only The Sunny Hours Film Show at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading on 23rd June 2018; shown in Cally Trench and Elisabetta Balasso: Original Board and Card Games at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading on 7th September 2019; and screened at Stand Up Cinema: Silent Films at the Rising Sun Arts Centre, Reading on 20th September 2019. |
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A Follower of Holy and Godly Matrons (2021) is a very short animation film in which Cally Trench appears and disappears while wearing a variety of bridal veils. The title of the film comes from a sentence in the church wedding service used in the 1960s when the artist was a child and a bridesmaid... that this woman may be loving and amiable, faithful and obedient to her husband; and in all quietness, sobriety, and peace, be a follower of holy and godly matrons. With English captions and spoken English words. [54 seconds] The photographs in A follower of holy and godly matrons also exist in the form of an artist's book, made as part of the AMBruno Cover project. In the book, nine tipped-in glossy photographs are concealed/protected by translucent paper, and accompanied by detailed technical descriptions of each veil. A earlier silent version of A Follower of Holy and Godly Matrons was shown in Cally Trench and Elisabetta Balasso: Original Board and Card Games at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading on 7th September 2019; and screened at Stand Up Cinema: Silent Films at the Rising Sun Arts Centre, Reading on 20th September 2019. |
Feet (2021) is very short animation film in which feet - sometimes socked, sometimes naked, and sometimes with one sock on and one sock off - wriggle and fidget. The film is made up of 239 drawings that Cally Trench made of her own feet. The sound is created from Cally repeatedly saying the word 'rhubarb', as if the two feet are chatting to each other. [41 seconds] |
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Feet was an Award Winner for Best Micro Short in the Dreamachine International Short Film Festival, Los Angeles, USA for Winter 2021. |
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Burial was a Finalist in the 2022 Shiver International Film Festival, Ontario, Canada. |
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Feet was an Official Selection in the 2022 New Jersey International Short Film Festival, with an online screening via xerb.tv in May 2022. |
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Feet was an Official Selection in the 2022 Microacts 11 - Artist Film Screenings, with a live screening in London in May 2022. An earlier silent version of Feet was shown in Draw/Bridge, Zug/Brücke (curated by Alex Dewart) at ARTHOUSE1, London in 2017; and was screened at Soundstripes at The Making Space, Huddersfield (silent film screening with live scoring) on 12th October 2017. The silent version was also shown in Lost & Found (curated by Mervyn Diese) at the Hundred Years Gallery, Hoxton, London in November 2017; shown in Siblings Cannot Agree in September 2018; and shown in Cally Trench and Elisabetta Balasso: Original Board and Card Games at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading on 7th September 2019. |
Fossil Fish Film (2020) is a very short silent animation film in which fossil fish appear, swim about, and freeze in their final resting places. It is based on the artist's linocut print 22 Fossil Fish. [38 seconds] "That's a very interesting idea - that the fossils were 'alive' before their final resting place." (Nick Trench) |
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Fossil Fish Film was an Official Selection in the Birkenhead International Film Festival (BIFF): 30 Second Film Festival, and was screened online from June 2021 and live at the Convenience Gallery, Birkenhead in July 2021. Fossil Fish Film was also screened in Soundstripes 5, in which silent films were scored by improvising musicians, at Abbeydale Picture House, Sheffield in 2021. |
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Fossil Fish Film was screened online on YouTube in the Emerging Artists Film Festival, Calgary, Canada for July 2021, where it was a Finalist in the Animated Shorts section. |
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Fossil Fish Film received an Honorable Mention in the Berlin Flash Film Festival for September 2021. |
Objects from a Sixties Childhood (2020) by is a very short silent film in which black-and-white drawings appear for one second each. Some objects are instantly recognisable - a teddy bear, a stamp, a custard cream biscuit. Others may be mysterious to those not alive at the time - a pagoda-like paraffin heater, a Brownie 127 camera, a jelly mould. Some are personal: the brass elephant that her father gave her, a Chinese coin, her grandmother's brooch, her mother's locket. A decade flashes past in a minute. |
Screaming Goddess (2018) is a short silent animation film, with an ink and charcoal drawing as its starting point. [32 seconds] Screaming Goddess was first shown, installed in a velvet-lined pink kitchen bin, in Enshrine (curated by Rekha Sameer) at the Crypt Gallery, St Pancras Church, Euston Road, London, 21-22 July 2018. "Loved this at Enshrine. Strange how it was silent and deafening at the same time." (Steve Perfect)Screaming Goddess was also shown in Siblings Cannot Agree in September 2018; shown in Cally Trench and Elisabetta Balasso: Original Board and Card Games at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading on 7th September 2019; and screened at Stand Up Cinema: Silent Films at the Rising Sun Arts Centre, Reading on 20th September 2019. |
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Screaming Goddess was an Official Selection in the 2021 Women Over Fifty Film Festival (WOFFF), 25th September - 2nd October 2021, and was screened online in WOFFF's Hide and Seek: films of loss, looking and locating online programme, including participation by Cally Trench in a Q&A with the curator. "A wonderful film! A wonderful filmmaker! Thanks for sharing your super short, super funny, super silent animation with WOFFF this year." (Women Over Fifty Film Festival) |
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Screaming Goddess was a Semi-Finalist in the Boden International Film Festival (BIFF), Sweden, August 2021. |
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Screaming Goddess was also an Official Selection in the 2022 Cardora Micro-Movie Film Festival. |
Windmills (2017) is a very short animation film based on one of Cally Trench's linocut prints, with music specially written for the film by composer Josh Hagley. Eight children's windmills survive a storm and make a break for freedom. [57 seconds] Windmills was shown in The Art of Dying at Wycombe Museum, November 2017 to April 2018. |
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Windmills was an Official Selection in the Big Teeth Small Shorts Film Festival, and was screened live on 11th November 2021 at Twisted Hippo Brewing, Chicago, USA. "It was a joy to feature your beautiful animation and we hope to see more of your work in the future." (Big Teeth Small Shorts Film Festival) |
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Windmills was an Official Selection in the Life Screenings International One Minute Film Festival - Virtual Edition November 2021. Curated by Banks Helfrich. Screened via Facebook on Saturday 13th November 2021. |
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Windmills was also an Official Selection in the 2022 Micomania Film Fest, and can be seen online on the Micromania channel in the Animation section. |
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Undressing Nationality (2017) is a short silent stop-motion film, devised by Cally Trench and Philip Lee, performed by Philip Lee, and photographed and edited by Cally Trench. The last few seconds feature Philip Lee's naked body, representing a human being without nationality. [48 seconds] Undressing Nationality was shown in PASSport Britannia at Safehouse 1, London (curated by Rekha Sameer) on 30th July 2017; screened at the Only The Sunny Hours Film Show at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading on 23rd June 2018; and screened at Stand Up Cinema: Silent Films at the Rising Sun Arts Centre, Reading on 20th September 2019. |
Roses Hat (2017) is made up of photographs taken on a 1950s Kodak Brownie 127 camera using black-and-white film, with the hat coloured by hand digitally. The music was specially written for the film by composer Josh Hagley. [20 seconds] Roses Hat was screened at Videovada 2017, Festival of the Moving Image, OVADA, Oxford on 15th June 2017; screened at the Film Night on 10th November 2017 during Lost & Found (curated by Mervyn Diese) at the Hundred Years Gallery, London; and shown in Only The Sunny Hours in June 2018 at OHOS, Brock Keep, Reading. |
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A Walk in the Cemetery (2017) shows a lanky Chaplinesque young man, dressed in a black suit, white shirt and black bow tie and carrying a black furled umbrella, walking along a tree-lined path in a cemetery - suggestive of the final scene in Carol Reed's 1949 film The Third Man. The music written specially for the film by composer Josh Hagley. [54 seconds] A Walk in the Cemetery was shown in The Art of Dying at Wycombe Museum, November 2017 to April 2018. |
Face (2017) focuses on one man's face. He starts by blinking and smiling, like a simple computer animation, but his choreographed expressions become more and more extravagant and extraordinary, before reverting back to blinking and smiling. The music written specially for the film by composer Josh Hagley. The face belongs to performance artist Philip Lee. [1 minute 3 seconds] Face (2017) was shown in Faces by Cally Trench at Buckinghamshire County Museum, Aylesbury from 15th July to 9th September 2017; screened at the Candid Projection Room, London on 19th September 2017; and screened at the Film Night on 10th November 2017 during Lost & Found (curated by Mervyn Diese) at the Hundred Years Gallery, London. An earlier silent version of Face (2010) was screened at Project 101 Video Installation, The LAB Gallery, New York (an AMBruno project curated by Sophie Loss) in November 2011 |
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Peephole Hut (2016) is a made-for-camera version of a performance by Cally Trench and Philip Lee, in which they play rock, paper, scissors inside a brightly-lit black hut, observed from outside through peepholes. The film, which Cally Trench sped up and edited, is fast-moving and jerky in the manner of old silent movies, with music written specially for the film by composer Josh Hagley. [4 minutes 20 seconds] Peephole Hut was performed live on 17th November 2016 in Visions in the Nunnery, curated by Cinzia Cremona and Tessa Garland, at Bow Arts, London. The film of Peephole Hut was shown in Live Art Cinema: It's Alive!, organised by Homes for Waifs and Strays and the Magic Cinema, at The Edge, Birmingham on 25th May 2017; screened at the Candid Projection Room, London on 19th September 2017; and screened at the Only The Sunny Hours Film Show on 23rd June 2018 at OpenHandOpenSpace, Reading. |
Hand (2016) is a very short animation film made up of drawings that Cally Trench made of her left hand, which appears to drum on a surface or maybe play invisible musical instruments. The music was specially written for the film by composer Josh Hagley. [18 seconds] Hand was shown in Draw/Bridge, Zug/Brücke (curated by Alex Dewart) at ARTHOUSE1, London in 2017; and screened at the Film Night on 10th November 2017 during Lost & Found (curated by Mervyn Diese) at the Hundred Years Gallery, London. A silent version was shown projected in Making Connections at South Hill Park, 2020. |
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Pink House (2016) is a very short animation film based on one of Cally Trench's linocut prints, with music written specially for the film by composer Josh Hagley. When disaster strikes, we just want the world to go back to the way it was before. As the sea recedes, the impossible happens. [42 seconds] "Love the videos with the music. Work well together, enhance each other to make one fuller, more complex whole." (Sophie Loss, 2017)Pink House was screened at Videovada 2017, Festival of the Moving Image, OVADA, Oxford on 15th June 2017; and screened at the Candid Projection Room, London on 19th September 2017. |
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Pink House was an Official Selection in the Life Screenings International One Minute Film Festival - Virtual Edition February 2022. Curated by Banks Helfrich. Screened via Facebook on Sunday 6th February 2022, including participation by Cally Trench in a Q&A with the curator. |
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Pink House was a Nominee for Best One Minute Film in the 2022 Indiefilmopolis Film Festival, with a live screening at the Actress & Bishop in The Jewellery Quarter, Birmingham on 27th February 2022, including participation by Cally Trench in a Q&A. "Hypnotic, calming and somewhat nostalgic. Love it." (Indiefilmopolis Film Festival judge) |
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Pink House was an Official Selection in the 2022 Cardora Micro-Movie Film Festival. |
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In Cemetery Botany (2016), the stone carvings of flowers on Victorian and Edwardian graves come to life. The music was specially written for the film by composer Josh Hagley. [2 minutes 21 seconds] "I love the Cemetery Botany one, the opposition between life and death... It's just great." (Valérie Mary, 2015)"Cemetery Botany - simple but beautiful." (Diana Bell, 2015)"Mmmmm... interesting, they instantly have the Cally Trench playful pop art manner about them. There is the feeling of passage of time, change, aging and the essence of revitalisation. Cemeteries are amazing places, markers of past lives. There is something satisfying and worthwhile about freshly retracing directly over the old. I like colouring in, not enough importance is placed on the process. I really like it when you colour in the leaves and the different ways you colour them. Lurid colours over mouldy stone is quite funny really; of course to an artist/historian it reads as a playful nod to the original coloured intentions of ancient sculpture, the digital application really highlights the colouring process well I think." (Guy Tarrant, 2015)"J'aime beaucoup cette video. Simple, explicite et l'idée me plait. Les tombes sont toujours très mornes et cela fait du bien de voir ce qu'ils imaginaient en les faisant c'était finalement bien plus gai que le résultat bien trop sage." (Kaliko, 2015)Cemetery Botany was screened at the Candid Projection Room, London on 19th September 2017; and shown in The Art of Dying at Wycombe Museum, November 2017 to April 2018. An earlier silent version of Cemetery Botany was screened at Videovada 2016 Festival of the Moving Image at OVADA, Oxford, on 24th June 2016. |
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Sphinx (2016) is another very short animation film based on one of Cally Trench's linocut prints. The music for Sphinx was specially written for the film by composer Josh Hagley. [25 seconds] "Your videos are great and very funny. I love the fact you take linocut prints to this level of almost seeing them being made." (Valérie Mary, 2015) |
The Horse's Mouth (2016) is a very short dream-like animation film, created from a series of drawings and collages. The music was specially written for the film by composer Josh Hagley in 2016. [27 seconds] |
In Chess Wars (2016), a very short stop-motion film, the board becomes a playground for chess gymnastics and a battle ground between chess and draughts pieces. The music was specially written for the film by composer Josh Hagley in 2016. [58 seconds] Chess Wars was screened at the Candid Projection Room, London on 19th September 2017. An earlier silent version of Chess Wars was shown in At Play 3 at South Hill Park, Bracknell (curated by Outi Remes and Cally Trench) in 2011, and screened at Project 101 Video Installation, The LAB Gallery, New York (an AMBruno project curated by Sophie Loss). |
Ice Lollies (2015) is a very short silent animation film, based on one of Cally Trench's linocut prints; the lollies melt and drip. [16 seconds] Ice Lollies was screened at Soundstripes at The Making Space, Huddersfield (silent film screening with live scoring) on 12th October 2017. |