WEEK 3

WORKSHOP

During this week’s workshop we were presented with a number of different artworks related to time. Differently from the previous workshops of artist research we had done in previous semesters, this time we weren’t asked to draw while watching the artworks but to focus on just looking at them and drawing only during five minute breaks we had in the middle. I quite enjoyed this new technique as it allowed me to fully concentrate on the looking, which made my focus and creative process much easier.

This were my two drawing responses:

The two works that I decided to follow up on are: Outer space by  Peter Tscherkassky and La Jetée by Chris Marker.

ARTIST RESEARCH 1, OUTER SPACE:

This film really caught my attention weirdly, as I don’t normally like horror films, but I was so fascinated by the process behind and the skill of the production of this movie that I didn’t even remember to be scared.

 Through disjointed images and distorted sounds, Tscherkassky constructs a haunting work that laughs at the need for traditional narratives and normative depictions of time as well as space. Double-exposures create fascinating juxtapositions which threaten to destroy the medium with their uncontrolled volatility. The over exposures of footage on top of footage make the film an abstract combination of moving images, that make the mind of the viewer imagine what must be happening in the scene even when they are unable to see. I found that this abstract nature of the film was particularly successful on this film, as the not knowing the action or not having a figurative image all the time adds tension to the whole composition more than perhaps scary figurative scenes like the ones used in other horror films.

Tscherkassky is an Austrian director at the forefront of avant-garde film practice. He continues to employ celluloid as a singular material with which to investigate theories of subjectivity, memory and perception, as well as the aesthetic limits of the cinematographic image. Tscherkassky sculpts with time and space, rhythms and arrhythmia in a way that feels like an entirely new film space, a new language altogether.

ARTIST RESEARCH 2, La Jetée:

La Jetée is a 1962 French science fiction featurette directed by the French director Chris Marker.Constructed almost entirely from still photos, it tells the story of a post-nuclear war experiment in time travel. It is 28 minutes long and shot in black and white. La Jetée is constructed almost entirely from optically printed photographs playing out as a photomontage of varying rhythm. It contains only one brief shot originating on a motion-picture camera, this due to the fact that Marker could only afford to hire one for an afternoon.The film has no dialogue aside from small sections of muttering in German and people talking in an airport terminal. The story is told by a voice-over narrator.The editing of La Jetée adds to the intensity of the film. With the use of cut-ins and fade-outs, it produces the unsettling nature adding to the theme of the apocalyptic destruction of World War III. Another important aspect of the film editing is the use of sound, as it is the only constant variable in this photomontage. As the story moves from the past to the present, La Jetee creates mental continuity. The soundtrack adds to the illusion of movement within the film and the change of time.

DEVELOPMENT OF MY PROJECT

As lasat semester it really helped me to have a set structure of the semester in order to keep track of the process and to not fall behind the deadlines I decided to create a caledar of my project progression througout the weeks of the semester. This was it:

Although, on Friday I had my tutorial with Miranda and we discussed the way that I was gonna present my project at the takeover, and discussing the richness of the editing process and the infinite number of combinations that you can do with footage in order to come up with compleatly different films whilst using the same footage, we came up with the idea of creating three diferen films with the same footage, edited in different ways, and create a video installation using three projectors and therefore give an added layer of time to the project as well as using the opportunity of the Takeover to present my project in a more creative and impactful way to the audience. These were my notes of the tutorial:

This change in the outcome of my project for this semester, will therefore also change my schedule for the semester, and therefore I will have to remake my project’sdevelopment calendar this week.

EDITING PROCESS:

During this weeks I continued with the editing of the film, mainly focused on editing the morning scenes. There were a lot of trials and errors and I enjoy now being able to give myself the space and time to experiment with the editing process.

Editing notes:

In some occasions I am unsure of which are the best stylistic options so I have decided to create both options and present them in my tutorials or to my friends to get feedback. For example, in the morning scenes, in the scenes were Abidish does yoga with the nut, I am not sure whether to overlay footage on top of each other or not. I think the first option is very aesthetic but I am not sure if it makes it loose power. These are the two outcomes that I am debating on:

OPTION 1:

OPTION 2: