沃特·鲁特曼，《Opus2》

　　沃特·鲁特曼(1887年12月28日—1941年7月15日)曾创作出可能是现存最早的动画电影Lichtspiel Opus 1 (1919—1921)。他和当时很多电影人一样，最早都是从画家起步的。鉴于沃特·鲁特曼将视觉艺术，电影还有科技结合在一起，电影评论记者丹尼尔·柯腾舒尔特实际上把沃特视为“第一位新媒体艺术家”。未来主义者和利奥博德·苏尔瓦治都已经将程式化抽象实验置入电影，但是不如鲁特曼那么坚持和严格。鲁特曼将自己完全投入在了这个新技术媒介当中。

　　鲁特曼的电影Lichtspiel Opus 1是该系列四部作品当中的第一部：在黑色的背景之下，色彩绚丽的几何图像在自由游动，充分诠释了“litchtspiel”这个词语的含义(本意是“光的展现”，在德语中，旧指“电影”)。Opus 1因此是一部上世纪60年代和70年代前卫“物质电影”和“结构电影”的早期先驱作品。“物质电影”和“结构电影”在尝试表现出电影和电影创作过程中的基本条件(物质、时间，灯光等)。当然，鲁特曼的电影也常常和包豪斯运动这个大背景联系在一起。包豪斯运动旨在将艺术和科技，视觉艺术相连结。甚至连马克思·布丁都为这个实验动画专门作曲。当Litchspiel Opus 1在1921年4月27日于柏林的Marmorhaus首映的时候，它受到了公众的热烈欢迎。媒体方面，包括电影评论家都被这流动的画作展现出的新可能所震撼。1925年伦敦《泰晤士报》曾预言这部电影将在相当长的一段时间里被人津津乐道。在Litchtspiel Opus 1中，鲁特曼集中的体现出圆形和角状物的冲突和对抗。他将Opus 1中的原则继续施行在时长4分钟的Opus 2当中，将随时由圆形变换成角状的脉动彩色形状连结起来。

　　Walther (later: Walter) Ruttmann (28 December 1887–15 July 1941), who produced what was probably the earliest surviving abstract animated film, LICHTSPIEL OPUS 1 (1919-1921), began as a painter, like many of his fellow filmmakers at the time. Given this combination of visual art, film and technology, film journalist Daniel Kothenschulte actually sees Walter Ruttmann as the “first new media artist”. The Futurists and Leopold Survage had already formulated abstract experiments in film, but not as consistently and rigorously as Ruttmann, who gave himself up entirely to the new technical medium.

　　His film LICHTSPIEL OPUS 1, the first of four in this series, plays with colourful geometric shapes against a black background, thus taking seriously the word “Lichtspiel” (literally “play of light”, an early German term for motion pictures). OPUS 1 is thus an early forerunner of the avant-garde “material film” and “structural film” of the 1960s and ’70s, which sought to reflect the basic conditions of film and filmmaking (materials, time, light etc.). Of course Ruttmann’s film can also be seen in the context of the Bauhaus movement, which sought to unite art and technology, and as visual music, even though Max Butting composed music specifically for this experimental animated film. When LICHTSPIEL OPUS 1 was world-premiered on 27 April 1921 at Berlin’s Marmorhaus, it received an exuberant public reception. The press, including film critics, were thrilled at the new possibilities of this moving painting. In 1925 the London Times prophesied that the film would be remembered for a long time to come. In LICHTSPIEL OPUS 1, Ruttmann plays intensively with the contrast and antagonism of round and angular shapes. He takes up those principles from OPUS 1 in his four-minute OPUS 2, combining pulsating coloured shapes that alternate between round and angular.