“Martina‘s film on Kubelka is the best film on any artist that I‘ve ever seen. The trick she used was so simple and so difficult: she kept herself out of it. What she gave us is pure Kubelka.” (Jonas Mekas)
“Martina Kudláček invites us to an intimate meeting with Johann Sebastian Bach, or equivalent, and speaking our language. Stan Brakhage of the conspicuous ego considered him the greatest filmmaker. I‘m content when anyone hits their stride -Oscar Micheaux!- and he‘s surely the greatest Peter Kubelka we could have, he who taught us how damn interesting perfection could be.” (Ken Jacobs)
“How you portray a Renaissance man? With the perseverance of a skilled Nature filmmaker, Martina Kudláček observed Peter Kubelka for many years with her hand-held camera and gave him all the time in the world to expose us to his unfolding vision. As a result she presents a four-hour masterpiece about one of the most influential artists in film history and one of the most original thinkers and critics of our times.” (Peter Tscherkassky)
„A Feminist’s Beer Ads and Safaris“ by NICOLAS RAPOLD in NEW YORK TIMES,
May 2, 2013
Recalling the shivery sensation of watching an African sunset and immediately hearing the pounding of tribal drums, the Austrian filmmaker Peter Kubelka sensed the drummers’ deep desire to communicate “the feeling that you are alive now.”
It’s a feeling that Mr. Kubelka embodies with every ecstatic minute of his movies — or, as he puts it in Martina Kudlacek’s exceptional documentary “Fragments of Kubelka,” every “now moment.” Engaging and thorough, Ms. Kudlacek’s film is a charismatic extended performance by a philosopher-poet who may change the way you think about art, time and raspberries.
„The Big Ones: Fragments of Kubelka“
by MICHAEL SICINSKI in FANDOR, April 30, 2013
„There is a glorious irony, by no means overlooked by documentary filmmaker Martina Kudláček (In the Mirror of Maya Deren), in the fact that her film Fragments of Kubelka is a nearly four-hour excursion into the work, life and philosophy of a man whose own cinematic output is characterized above all for its absolute, almost crystalline density and parsimony. “
Movie Review by DAVID FEAR in TIME OUT NEW YORK, April 30, 2013
„..A whirling tour of one man’s wide-ranging thoughts that requires stamina but leaves you rewarded.“
„Thoughts on Fragments of Kubelka“ by ERIK LUERS in CINE THEATRICS, May 9, 2013
„A visual biography and career overview immersed in film and cooking theory, Martina Kudláček’s new doc profile, Fragments of Kubelka, may very well stand the test of time as the definitive document of avant garde filmmaker Peter Kubelka.“
„I Built Then My Ecstasy: On Peter Kubelka’s Cinema“ by MICHAEL METZGER in IDIOM, May 3, 2013
„… Kubelka had focused intensely on the film frame as a compositional unit, he now sought a new way to “frame” film culturally, turning to the study of cooking, anthropology, and music to situate cinema within the larger field of human endeavor. Fragments of Kubelka admirably charts the course of this capacious erudition, a horizonless field of curiosity for which cinema steadfastly provides both an anchor and a rudder.
Movie Review by JOHN DEFORE in THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER, May 2, 2013
„…True to its subject’s sometimes peculiar aesthetic ethics, Martina Kudlacek’s Fragments of Kubelka never insults his celluloid creations by transferring them to digital media. Instead it takes oblique glances at the shorts while letting their maker speak, and speak, and speak. Serious cineastes will find much to appreciate in the film … “
Movie Review by GAMMAREAY in TINYMIXTAPES,
„Fragments of Kubelka, Martina Kudláček’s sprawling and illuminating documentary, exposes the depth and eclectic qualities of filmmaker Peter Kubelka’s cinematic work.“
VIENNALE – KATALOG TEXT von Oktober, 2012
„Eine dokumentarische Beschreibung des Künstlers und Menschen Peter Kubelka ist ein nahezu unmögliches Unterfangen.“
Ankündigung im RAY FILMMAGAZIN, Oktober, 2012
Fragments of Kubelka: An interview with Experimenta curator MARK WEBBER
Institute of Contemporary Arts, London Film Festival, 7 October 2012
“In this extended portrait, Peter Kubelka speaks at length about his life, work and interests, drawing on a vast range of knowledge and experience. Active as a filmmaker since the 1950s, Kubelka’s acclaimed cinematic works are only one aspect of his dynamic personality. In his legendary public lectures, he holds forth on a variety of disciplines including film, music, archaeology and cooking. He has also played an important institutional role in establishing the Austrian Film Museum, and as co-founder of Anthology Film Archives, for whom he designed an ideal viewing theatre known as the Invisible Cinema. Martina Kudláček (known for previous documentaries on Maya Deren and Marie Menken) immersed herself in Kubelka’s world for several years, researching historical footage, recording lectures, and perhaps most importantly, filming him at home surrounded by his eclectic collection of anthropological objects. In these precious sequences, Fragments of Kubelka provides extraordinary insight in conveying his philosophy on life and art.”
„The Quietus“ by PATRICK SMITH, October 2012
London Film Festival “Fragments of Kubelka”
Patrick Smith watches Martina Kudlácek’s epic profile of Austrian experimental cinema veteran Peter Kubelka, who presents a BFI Southbank lecture screening at the 56th London Film Festival on Sunday afternoon…
Interview for (S8) Mostra de Cinema Periférico, Spain
with Martina Kudláček by ELENA DUQUE, May 2012
„Fragments of Kubelka“ by CHRISTIAN HÖLLER, February 2012
A film about the master artist Peter Kubelka (born 1934, Vienna) and how he has created a monument, not only to himself but also to the era of analog cinema which is coming to an end. For nearly four hours, “Fragments of Kubelka” accompanies the filmmaker as he elucidates his work, his life, even the totality of sensory perceptions of a physical embrace of the world. In an apparently seamless monologue Kubelka creates a broad, sensual arc from the beginnings of his work in the 1950s to his favorite recurring themes of cooking, metrics and time, language, and metaphor in the world of things…
“Fragments of Kubelka” von CHRISTIAN HÖLLER, Februar 2012
„Bruchstücke und wie sie sich zu einem mosaikhaften Monument formen. Fragments of Kubelka setzt dem Filmemacher und Großkünstler Peter Kubelka ein filmisches Denkmal zu Lebzeiten. Darüber hinaus schafft das fast vierstündige Porträt aber auch, in exkursiven wie diskursiven Schleifen, ein veritables Monument für die schwindende Ära des analogen Kinos. Eine Ära und ein Medium, dessen ureigenste Spezifik und Materialität hochzuhalten Peter Kubelka niemals müde geworden ist;“