Week three reading response: Surrealism
Reading response week three: Sorcery and cinema (Artaud, Antonin 2000)
Firstly, this might be the one of the best things I’ve ever read. Normally articles take a long time to get the point and use plenty of long words I have never heard of; the ideas in this paper are concise and just outstanding. If I’m reading the date correctly that this is written circa 1928 then the vision is spectacular and thought process is pretty amazing. This pushes the boundary of thinking in terms of cinema before its time and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I wasn’t sure how to respond to it initially so I just picked out a few quotes that really jumped out to me to start.
“One day soon we will probably have cinema in three dimensions, even cinema in colour…. cinema itself and which makes a language out of it, as music, painting, and poetry are a language.”
“That’s why the cinema seems to me to be made, above all else, to express things of the mind, the inner life of consciousness, not so much through the play of images as through something more imponderable that restores them to us with their matter intact, without intermediate forms, without representations.”
I like the idea of cinema pushing the norm and inviting people to view a unique personality of the creator on screen; because everyone is unique in his or her way. The following few quotes also stuck with well after I finished reading (again, I really find it awesome this was written so long ago).
“More than any other art the cinema is capable of expressing the representations of this domain, because stupid order and habitual clarity are its enemies.”
“If the cinema isn’t made to express dreams or everything that in waking life has something in common with dreams, then it has no point. Cinema will bear a greater and greater resemblance to the fantastic, that fantastic of which it is increasingly observed that it is really the real in its entirety; otherwise, it doesn’t exist.”
This to me sums up surrealism (or what I understand it be) in an outstanding way and really appealed to me. It seems to like odd connection but what would I do (mainly in terms of humour or making people laugh) when I am going to write a script for something or create a film/TV show is take cliché trends and make them unique in a funny way. I don’t really get annoyed at a lot of things can’t stand when people do any task or create anything in a particular quite simply because it is the way others have done it.
The quote in bold resonated with me the most because as it says in the reading above, “stupid order and habitual clarity” are the enemy of cinema. I can’t stand watching or reading something that is the same as nearly other thing in its genre and you know what is going to happen before it actually does. I think the best way to creatively make anything is to leave your personal unique imprint. Turning the cliché into something that hasn’t been done before is the way to go and this is what surrealism and this reading is focussed getting people to do; taking the norm and making it “fantastic” or marvellous. This can only benefit cinema in creating unique and engaging content and is an area that really appeals to me. This is just an exceptional reading with some great ideas considering the time it was written.
Reference:
Hammond, P 2000, Shadow and its shadow: surrealist writings on the cinema, 3rd edition revised, pp. 103-106, City Lights Books, San Francisco.
Week 11 Exercise
Interactive artwork concept:
This is an extremely ambitious concept and I have no idea if it would be plausible, but my interactive artwork would be water activated pictures in a frame. It would be a gallery full of frames filled with water and each would have shapes that water flows into to create a picture behind glass covering in the frame. Behind this would be lights that illuminate based on where the water is to better show the image. The first image below is the best I could find to show what I had in mind for the water flowing into a shape and being illuminated to better show it. The second is to show the frame concept, if you rotate it what you see changes because the water flows into a different shape/image and is lit up by a different set of lights.
Rationale:
I am a bit of a film enthusiast so the theme of the gallery would be famous film scenes. The viewer could walk through the gallery and turn the frame around to see a different scene (either with their hand or if that’s not practical for safety reasons just push a button to make it rotate). Each frame reveals four different famous scenes (one for each angle of the frame). This is best suited to the between images gallery because of the variety of different films which could be displayed at the same time and the ability to represent more than one film with each piece. The gallery could potentially be a delight for other film enthusiasts to view film scenes in a unique way. The underlying tone of the gallery would be that films can be interpreted in different ways depending on how you look at them.
Reading response: Week 10 reading on found footage
Reading in focus – The remake: old movies, new narratives (Balsom, Erika, 2013)
Balsom (2013) focuses a lot on specific examples of remaking old footage, going into great detail of particular works. She talks a great deal about Candice Breitz and a few things stuck out to me in those passages. Balsom (2013) mentions that sometimes continuing the remaking of old film rests on artists/fans making use of new technologies available to continue new representations of old media. Breitz’s recycling of old romantic comedies in Becoming Drew is a great example of making use of new technology to create a new meaning through film because it takes old footage and edits them together in a manner not available at the time of the original films.
Another interesting aspect of using found footage in the reading is when Balsom (2013) talks about Mother and Father. Six screens were placed in a row to form multiple visuals of mothers and fathers from various Hollywood films. This allowed the topic at hand of parenting to be explored using a variety of films at the same time. This is a great advantage of using found footage; taking a variety of different ideas, notions and films from various points in history and using them to explore and analyse different concepts at the same time in one film.
The other main part of the reading that jumped out to me is when Balsom (2013) mentions the way that found footage film making can continue to push the boundaries of what is possible in cinema. Balsom (2013) claims Hitchcock is often credited for changing habits of how people watch films. Hitchcock would refuse admission to people who were late and not allow people to duck in and out of a film like they were used doing. With the remake 24 Hour Psycho the viewer has now been given back that power to walk in and out of a film as they please. The spectator is free to walk around a screen when they please with the film being projected for 24 hours. I liked how this remake reverses the way the original film was meant to be viewed. It pushes the boundary of how a film is viewed using the original old footage and creates a fresh perspective on it.
Overall the message of the reading is that what some people mind might find old and outdated can be collated into something special using a fresh perspective. The meaning can be revived, or just the way in which a film viewed, through a new perspective from an individual or group. The found footage maker can also add something to the film which didn’t exist at the time the original was made. To me this is a powerful type of filmmaking which should continue to be explored. As Balsom expresses in the reading, it gives people the opportunity to analyse different concepts at the same, change the way the film is watched, or just revive the meaning if it’s still relevant today.
Reference:
Balsom, E 2013, Exhibiting Cinema in Contemporary Art, Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam
Week Eight/Nine Exercise
Travel Essay:
Rationale:
This is an essay that gives a recollection of travelling around Canada and America. The images and videos are of various places I had seen or heard of in movies or television. Some of them are not famous places, but just momentous occasions, such as seeing snow for the first time. The essay film documents my reaction to experiencing them in real life. I used my voice instead of text to give the essay film a personal touch. This hopefully gives the viewer a greater feeling of my take on each experience and connects the visual together with the words to leave my personal touch. What I understood the essay film to be, and in particular the travel essay, was a visual documentation of spaces and emotions with a personal connection. The main thing for me with this was giving personal significance to the images which would otherwise be random shots without the voiceover. I used to sit at home and see things in the essay on TV, so the thrill of experiencing them in real life was outstanding. The aim of this travel essay was an attempt to portray a personal feel of these different spaces around the world through my eyes.
Final project stills
These are stills from the footage I found to use for my final project. They are all shot on an old Super 8 camera in the late 1970’s or early 80s.
The first is a still of my Uncle (the main person who shot the films) the second is a few toys he did some stop motion with (quite funny to watch). The third one is the street my mum lived on when she was growing up. The footage is quite grainy and patchy and I’m not sure why but it just made me feel like I was watching someone remember random childhood moments in a dream, so this is the idea I was going with for my final project. As mentioned in my proposal I was looking at showing these back to people in the film and getting them to comment on what they see. I would then play the recording over the top or maybe use some quotes as text on screen, not sure yet. My overall plan is still to create a dream-like film of someone remembering their childhood through using found footage.
Week Seven Exercise
Andy Warhol-Style Screen test:
Rationale:
This is an attempt at creating a Warhol-Style black and white ‘screen test’. Like the examples, there is no sound included and it is shot as a close up portrait. I decided to tell my friend nothing about what this was meant to look like (wasn’t 100% sure myself), I just told him I would be filming his face close up. He laughs several times during the shoot and I’ve left that in as I think it gives the ‘screen test’ a unique feel. I felt it ended up being particular engaging to watch when he tries to hold it in, but laughs for a few seconds, and then manages to snap back into a serious face. I didn’t tell him anything about it or what to do so it was interesting to see his natural reactions to being in this screen test.
Week Six Exercise
James Benning Task
I go for a run twice a week in the city with a running group. I normally always park on Hutt Street because there is always free parking just before 6 pm (that’s right before the time the ticketed parking stops). Thought it would be an interesting place to use as I park my car in the same spot each time. Each frame is taken from the same spot at various times of the day, with my phone resting on the back of the my car. In one of the continuous shots the wind knocked my phone down flat. I was originally going to not use it but felt like it was a unique end to the film so left it in and used it as the last piece.
Week four exercise
Original commercial
New commercial brief:
A tired-looking person on screen is playing the violin with a chocolate bar. There are dreary colours behind them and slow, deep violin music is playing (the entire background is colours with the person in front). The dark, bland colours move slowly around behind them to the sound of the violin.
Someone looking spry walks in gleefully eating a banana, confused by the dark colours. They see the chocolate bar being used to play the violin and then hand them a banana and they start playing the violin with that. The violin sounds change to upbeat, happy music and the colours change to bright, playful colours. The colours move around with the music as bananas begin to float onto the screen in the background. They eventually jump around the screen with the music to form the shape of Australia.
The following text appears one after another with the banana shape of Australia in the background.
Change it up.
Energise.
Australian bananas.
Week Three Exercise
The guidelines of our original manifesto we used were:
- it has to be filmed on mobile phones
- a continuos soundtrack must be used
- there can be no dialogue
- the film must be shot on location.
Our surrealism film is someone having a nightmare about having to eat vegetables and being chased by toys and shapes. It reflects the concept of surrealism because it takes an everyday situation like a child having to eat vegetables and playing with toys and brings those objects to life. The film also a mysterious and dream-like feel about it. The film is an example of daily life activities (playing/eating broccoli) made strange.
Experimental Studio 