Running Out of Time: Eadweard Muybridge, 'Buffalo Running', and Cinema's First Act of Conservation

By the last quarter of the nineteenth century, photography became widely accepted as a medium capable of capturing moments in time, with the natural world serving as an important subject for many artists in the field. In the 1870s, Eadweard Muybridge made his mark as a photographer with stunning images of nature in the Yosemite[1]. Following the successful experiments with chronophotography by the end of the decade featuring horse gaits and athletes, he was quick to use the new medium to record animals in motion, most notably at the Philadelphia Zoo in the mid-1880s. The quick movements of these animals in captivity represented a milestone in our understanding of the fauna around us through visual technology. Amongst these works, though, one particular sequence stands apart, namely Buffalo Running.

By the time of Muybridge's recording, "the plains bison (buffalo) had been systematically slaughtered: from a pre-Columbian population of sixty million to a few thousands"[2]. Without any visible signs that this majestic animal is in captivity, this chronophotographic work is a celebration of the importance the buffalo played through the centuries in the American landscape. The gallop breathes with freedom, each trot displaying the full force of this bovine specimen. Even when looking at the individual photographs from this sequence, we are struck with awe, and lament for the demise of the species.

In the modern world, nature documentaries are often used as a reminder of the fragility of the natural world in a time ruled by human supremacy. Muybridge's work is the earliest attempt at using motion pictures to raise awareness of the destructive power of humankind. At a time when the buffalo was approaching possible extinction, this series of photographs would have been one of the few sources to attest to the existence of the species to later generations. Muybridge would have been keenly aware that in recording these images, he would imprint for posterity a unique relic. In this sense, he extended the use of chronophotography beyond the practical observation of the natural world towards a medium that could help audiences relive the past, to understand it, and ultimately to learn from it. As a result, wildlife documentary film finds its true beginnings in this humble work.

Certain projections of Buffalo Running reverse the movements, making it go backwards. Eleni Palis considers that this reversal "metaphorically troubles the logic of forward progress, visualising the backwardness, the immeasurable setback of white colonial destruction of peoples, cultures, and wildlife."[3] What we see here is the potential a few images in motion can have in the realm of idea generation. Our perception of film is no longer bound to the exact sequence of events recorded, rather it awakens in us considerations that are of a philosophical nature. Chronophotography in this way joins the other forms of art in its power to initiate intellectual discourse, whilst simultaneously maintaining its impartiality, as the image shown is not a personal interpretation of truth, but a true reflection of outer reality.

In The Little Soldier, Jean-Luc Godard stated through his character that "Photography is truth...and cinema is truth twenty-four times a second"[4]. Later, Michael Haneke extended this with "... and every cut is a lie"[5]. Given that chronophotography is a combination of static photographs, the continuous stitching together of the individual frames may generate an optical illusion of continuity; it is nonetheless an illusion. In her attempt to link Muybridge's work to CRISPR technology, Claire Correo Nettleton concluded that the "buffalo appears larger or smaller or in another location from one second to the next—which demonstrates anomalies in the editing process, revealing that the buffalo is not truly 'alive' in front of us."[6] This observation is an apt one for multiple reasons to assess whether the impartiality of Eadweard Muybridge and fellow documentarists who followed him can stand as a factor in the truthfulness of documentary film.

First of all, as chronophotography is not a continuous film image shot from a single point of view, we can easily dismiss its truthful representation of the fluidity of movement through its technological capabilities that permitted only recording of movement with the use of multiple cameras. This is not a key concern for this essay, especially if we consider the aim of proving that Buffalo Running is a genuine precursor to documentary film. Most importantly, we need to look at the staging and critically the motivation behind the work.

Even though we know that Muybridge worked extensively at the Philadelphia Zoo, there is little indication in the final images whether the animal was recorded in captivity or in the wild. Given the complexity of capturing moving photographs in 1883, it is safe to assume that the animal was in captivity. The staging of the run with an indistinct background gives the opportunity to see the final product as a reproduction of wildlife. However, the recording process also does not guarantee that the final sequence of photographs has been taken within the same time frame. Nettleton's observation does raise the possibility that the sequence is actually the collection of the best photographs taken at different stages that, when shown sequentially, can appear to be a continuous progression.

In practice, most nature documentarists to this day use various shots taken at different times to present a continuous narrative. The difficulties in capturing nature unnoticed present a dilemma to any director wanting to make a wildlife documentary. On the one hand, the unfiltered shots would be a truthful reflection of reality, on the other their rawness lacks the ability to complete a cohesive arc. As ultimately it is the narrative that gives the medium a chance to play a role in the realm of intellectual discourse, it is unsurprising that directors sacrifice the honesty of image capture in the hope of presenting a more complete thought process through a structured account. In this, the technical limitations of Buffalo Running are in no way preventing it from making a claim for the first ever nature documentary, as the particularities of recording are consistent with the practice of modern film-makers in concept.

Ultimately, a successful documentary is tightly linked to its narrative construction. Muybridge's motivation behind this work is also complex in that regard. On the one hand, this was a series that would inform biologists of the buffalo's movements to support the wider study of mammals' locomotion. However, given the fact that the buffalo was approaching extinction, it is tempting to assume that the main drive behind this work was to raise awareness of its possible disappearance. A year after the production of this work, several legislative acts started to be issued guaranteeing the protection of buffalo in the Yosemite[7], leading over time to a resurgence of the species in the United States. If we consider the cultural impact of Muybridge's successes in chronophotography from 1878 onwards, he would have hoped that his recording of this noble beast running freely in nature would have generated a genuine race to ensure that the buffalo would once again reign supreme in the American plains.

Buffalo Running may be a brief sequence of moving photographs, barely memorable to the inattentive viewer. However, this chronophotographic work laid the foundations for how documentary film was to develop technically. Most importantly, it places nature documentaries at the heart of the ecological discourse, shaping the political and cultural space.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX8a45mSaPA

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References:

[1] Smith, Lester. "Photographs on Glass" in Eadweard Muybridge: The Kingston Museum Bequest, edited by the Kingston Museum and Heritage Service; pp. 53-54. Hastings, East Sussex: The Projection Box, 2004.

[2] Winegard, Timothy C.. The Horse: A Galloping History of Humanity; p. 326. New York City: Dutton, 2024.

[3] Palis, Eleni. Classical Projections: The Practice and Politics of Film Quotation; p. 90. New York City: Oxford University Press, 2022.

[4] Godard, Jean-Luc. Le Petit soldat: Screenplay; p. 37. London: Lorrimer Publishing Limited, 1967.

[5] Miller, Jacqui. "Introduction" in Film and Ethics: What Would You Have Done?, edited by Jacqui Miller; p. 8. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2013.

[6] Correo Nettleton, Claire. "Resurrecting the Woolly Mammoth and Muybridge's Horse: CRISPR, Cinema, and Species Revival" in Art and Biotechnology: Viral Culture from CRISPR to COVID, edited by Claire Correo Nettleton & Louise Mackenzie; p. 25. London, New York City & Dublin: Bloomsbury, 2024

[7] Rees, Paul A.. The Laws Protecting Animals and Ecosystems; p. 423. Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley Blackwell, 2017.