"It put me in touch with Marilyn Brakhage [Stan's widow], and we came to a place where we're both happy with how things are done." The group's self-titled CD on Starlight Furniture Co. includes a disclaimer, written with Marilyn Brakhage's approval, that the music is neither a collaboration with Stan Brakhage nor a soundtrack for his films. "When we play, we present it as a live music event," explains Ranaldo. "We try to make it clear that if you want to experience the Brakhage films for what they are, you have to go see them in their proper context." "The comparison I use is that Peter Paul Rubens didn't create his paintings with the intention that they be used in a Robert Rauschenberg collage a few centuries later. I don't think [the Rauschenberg collage] should prevent anyone from going to see a Rubens painting on its own," adds Licht. "That's how we've attempted to frame these concerts, as live-action mixed media collages."
"[At a show] in Pittsburgh, Bruce Conner's Looking for Mushrooms with its fantastic Terry Riley soundtrack screened first, and it really set up the idea of combining a certain kind of music and a certain kind of visual," says Ranaldo. " Showing like-minded opening films is an idea we intend to pursue further; it helps set the tone for what we do." "It's also a good way to get these films out of the closed circuit of art houses and museums," adds Licht. "Brakhage is a very important innovator; he virtually created this entire form, and he still isn't that well known."
To date Text of Light has released three recordings: a one-sided 12" in Table of the Elements' Lanthanides series, a limited LP on German label Bottrop Boy, and the aforementioned CD, culled from three different performances.
