The Pittsburgh Documents
The Pittsburgh Documents
In the early 1970s, Stan Brakhage, the American filmmaker, made a series of films on three institutions in the city of Pittsburgh that are partially connected as instruments that control bodies: the police, the hospital and the morgue. United under the collective title The Pittsburgh Documents (sometimes also entitled The Pittsburgh Trilogy), the three films mark an epistemological break in Brakhage's work.

Eyes (1970)

22 December, 1970
“After wishing for years to be given the opportunity of filming some of the more “mystical” occupations of our Times – which the average imagination turns into “bogeyman”… viz: Policemen, Doctors, Soldiers, Politicians, etc. – I was at last permitted to ride in a Pittsburgh police car, camera in hand” - Stan Brakhage. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with The Film Foundation in 2011.

Deus Ex (1971)

19 September, 1971
A look at the inner workings of a hospital. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with The Film Foundation in 2011.

The Act of Seeing with One's Own Eyes (1972)

19 February, 1972
At a morgue, forensic pathologists conduct autopsies of the corpses assigned.