Lichtgrenze / Border of Lights

Designed by WHITEvoid to mark the anniversaries of the Wall's opening. Each balloon contains an LED light. These balloons will be released after 28 minutes, 1 minute for each year that the Wall divided the city. The installation marks where the Wall once stood, and celebrates the joy of freedom by releasing the balloons.

Eva Meyer-Keller also used balloons in Volksballons und geklonte Krieger at Palast der Republik, an installation also connecting time and memory.

Eva Meyer-Keller: http://www.evamk.de/daten/volksde.php
WHITEvoid: http://www.whitevoid.com/
WHITEvoid's Photostream:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/whitevoid/

web structures

I have been mapping websites, looking into structures and design, but I don't know how the Graft's site works, in relation to what I've learnt at uni this week. Or Get the Glass. The image below is the home page of Homeostatic.

Graft (2009) http://www.graftlab.com/ [08/01/2011]
California Milk Processor Board (2007) http://www.gettheglass.com/ [08/01/2011]
Homeostatic [2011] http://www.homeostatic.net/ [08/01/2011]

hosting transitional space

Art Cloud, at Schlossplatz, Berlin

Graft proposed to construct a temporary gallery in Berlin, where Palast der Repblik once stood, as a location which "breathes the identities of yesterday" today [Graft, 2011]. The "seemingly floating and resting for a moment" design fills the transition between "'what was' to 'what will be'". 

Graft [2011] Art Cloud: Here Today - Gone Tomorrow. [Online] http://www.graftlab.com/ [08/01/2011]

Imagine again

I have previously explored the HBO Imagine site, and have just come across their 14×14ft projection cube. Similarly to the website, audience were to choose from which side to view each scenes from. These were shot from 4 different angles, projecting diverse perceptions and experiences. The story came together after watching these scenes from all angles. Their message claimed, "sometimes a change in perspective changes everything".

The website had an interactive navigation, which allowed visitors to select the path in which they viewed each clips and images.

Thetrendwatch (2010) HBO Imagine. [Online] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2m7JcD0dK0&feature=related [08/01/2011]
Virutic (2010) HBO Imagine Integrated Campaign / BBDO New York. [Online] http://vimeo.com/14029101 [08/01/2011]
FunnyAdsWorldCom (2009) HBO: Imagine. [Online] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ko2tHPAPr74 [08/01/2011]

Down and out in London

During the heavy snowfall in London, I visited Serpentine, Haunch of Venison, Tate Britain, National Portrait galleries and BFI Southbank Centre in London. Here are some ideas I picked up.

June 8, 1968, 2009

Visitors were guided through four rooms/spaces at Philippe Parreno: Films 1987-2010, which included film/animation installations by the artist.

"In Invisibleboy (2010), the viewer is delved deep into a world of both fantasy and reality where the boundaries between fiction and documentary began to blur. The movie features the story of an illegal Chinese immigrant boy who sees imaginary monsters that are scratched onto the film stock. June 8, 1968 (2009) portrays the train voyage that transported the corpse of assassinated senator Robert Kennedy from New York to Washington D.C. Kennedy’s invisible body and the Invisibleboy are characters that float between several layers of reality." [The European Graduate School, 2010] 

Serpentine Gallery also was showing Tom Hunter's A Palace for Us, where the artist interviewed residents of Woodberry Down Estate. The film has a documentary style, but the artist re-enacts scenes to narrate their history.

Nicolas Provost also works with moving image, and in his solo show at Haunch of Venison includes Stardust and Storyteller.  

And Winter's Bone at BFI Southbank. A daughter searches for her father to avoid the house, where she lives with her younger siblings, from being seized by the court. It's her experience, struggles and interactions with her neighbours and relatives the audience observe. 

I've been unable to shoot the ideas I've had, since my checked-in bag has not yet been delivered from Munich airport. My battery charger, a remore timer and my tripod for my camera are all in the bag, and my work continues to be disrupted days after airports managed to clear their runways.

The European Graduate School [2010] Philippe Parreno - Biography. [Online]
http://www.egs.edu/faculty/philippe-parreno/biography/ [26/12/2010]

Haunch of Venison [2010] Nicolas Provost: Stardust. [Online]
http://www.haunchofvenison.com/en/#page=london.current.nicolas_provost [26/12/2010]

National Portrait Gallery [2010] Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize. [Online]
http://www.npg.org.uk:8080/photoprize/site10/index.php [26/12/2010]

Provost, N. [2010] Work. [Online] http://www.nicolasprovost.com/#/workThumbs
[26/12/2010]

RoadsideFlix [2010] Winter's Bone - Official US Theatrical Trailer in HD. [Online]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bE_X2pDRXyY [26/12/2010]

Serpentine Gallery  [2010] Exhibitions: Philippe Parreno: 25 November - 13 February. [Online]

http://www.serpentinegallery.org/2010/11/philippe_parreno_25_november_1_1.html
[26/12/2010] 

Serpentine Gallery  [2010] Tom Hunter: A Palace For Us: 8 December - 20 January. [Online]
http://www.serpentinegallery.org/2009/01/the_skills_exchange_project.html [26/12/2010]

Tate Britain [2010] Eadweard Muybridge. [Online] 

http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/exhibitions/eadweardmuybridge/default.shtm [26/12/2010]

Reflections on MSN4

My deadline has passed. I now have the time to reflect.

I have been generating ideas about still/moving images. I have thought about how I could develop the concept of memory and recollection on absence. One of the ideas I have used for MSN4 was to combine a video and a photograph in the same frame, to contrast motion and stillness - one represents present, and the other past. 

It also crosses the boundary of my photographic practices.

The idea to juxtapose present and past has been used by Amie Siegel in Berlin Remake. Sophie Calle combined interviews of people's memories in text and photographs of locations where monuments once occupied the space, displaying the absence.

I feel that my test images are too subtle and need stories, and more engaging elements. I have considered using sound and have been discussing this issue with people. I have intentions of creating an experience, rather than just an exhibit of my work, and looked at Jannis Kounellis' and Douglas Gordon's works, suggested by Shaun.

I want cues and excitement. 

My tests of the images, as well as projection, have worked out to an extent. I do feel that these need reinventing, to better project/reflect the concept of loss/past. I will investigate the relation of still and moving images, explore with time, and play/combine it with past and present. Neither slide show nor video.

I also want to further develop the projections, of smoke machine and frosted plastic sheets, with something vague and impermanent...

Bradley, F., Lingwood, J. & Gordon, D. [2010] Arts: Douglas Gordon, what have i done. [Online] http://arts.guardian.co.uk/pictures/0,,818576,00.html [14/12/2010]

Tate Online [2010] Jannis Kounellis. [Online] http://www.tate.org.uk/servlet/ArtistWorks?cgroupid=999999961&artistid=1438&page=1 [14/12/2010]

Tate Britain [2010] Douglas Gordon. [Online] http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/exhibitions/douglasgordon/default.shtm
[14/12/2010]

Presentation

Masters Project Proposal

Masters Project Proposal

Learning Agreement

Leaning Agreement

still movie tests

This clip is a test of an idea I had about the present/ongoing and the past. I used a Nikon DSLR to shoot both still and video images, and combined the two in to one frame. I still need to work on the quality of the clip, but the idea is there, and I think it works.

Half/half

I also want to try dividing the screen horizontally, or for the frame to be vertical...

as well as adding an image which covers only a small section of the frame.

I have also created two clips from a same set of still photographs, to be played at different speeds. Shots with less frames/sec appears more like individual images, like a slide show, whereas when more shots are squeezed in, it flows more like a clip.

Other experimental clips I made: http://vimeo.com/user5371109

Artists on Berlin

Artists I have focused on for this unit are, Tacita Dean, Sophie Calle and Amie Siegel. They have engaged with Berlin and its post-Wall characteristics. Tacita Dean's Fehnsehturm and Palast are film clips of politically symbolic architectures, and Berliners' perceptions are still linked to the historical background before unification.

Fehnsehturm

Palast

Sophie Calle's The Detachment combines both text and visual images to demonstrate melancholic atmosphere. By interviewing passers-by, Calle highlights how changes that followed the German unification is felt by its citizens. 

The Detachment 

Amie Siegel has produced numerous short-films relating to the topic. Berlin Remake (below) juxtapose clips shot by the former GDR film firm with that of current (or post-unification) Berlin.

Berlin Remake

The artists have connected and contrasted the history of East Berlin/Germany with how it has transformed through the process of unification, and the works not only documents but rotate towards creative expression. 

http://www.tate.org.uk/stives/exhibitions/dean/default.shtm

http://www.bundestag.de/htdocs_e/artandhistory/art/artists/calle/index.html

http://amiesiegel.net/project/berlin_remake

projection test 2

I have tested projecting on to 3 sheets of frosted plastic, and then viewing them from both sides, and also on to smoke. The idea is to create an atmosphere of recollection.

 Opal 030 3mm, front and back

Opal/White 040 3mm, front and back

Silk 040 3mm, front and back

The test with smoke proved to be difficult. I've connected a smoke machine to a wooden box with an open front, which I can cover up with different material for different effects. I would then project an image on to it.

This was the set up: the smoke machine connected to the box on the right, and a projector connected to a laptop.

The first material that was roughly woven did not hold/control the smoke at all.

  

I'd then added another material, which had a closer weave. It let the smoke gradually through, and the images were better projected on to it, although, after a second or two there would be too much smoke in front of it (below).

The key is to have many smaller holes for the smoke to be let out, and somehow blow the smoke away so that it doesn't build up. The room filled up with smoke very quickly... there might be a problem with smoke detectors inside the exhibition space too (unless it had a heat detector alarm).

projection test

I'm unable to find a drill to make holes in the test plastic sheets. I have been projecting images onto snow, and snow-covered bushes... with little success. 

It is crucial for the surface to be smooth and that it faces the projector flat for an actual presentation of the image - which now seems too obvious - but there were interesting effects.

I've managed to create a possible screen to-be also. I've been thinking of various material to use as the screen, such as plastic, mist, smoke, to achieve the desired atmosphere.

I'll look into ways of controlling mist and smoke tomorrow. Then plastic sheets, once I drill holes in them.

test shots

These are the test shots. Most of the images have been captured in sequences, so I can also explore creating moving image-like sequences from still photographs. Three images below were shot in Leiston, Suffolk. Only the leaves, or shadow of them, appear to move, as it was a still day.

I wanted to create a photo-video merging images with these shots. With part of the image being still, and part moving.

Images shot from train, and in rainy/snowy Norwich.

Life and Death in Venice

Life and Death in Venice (2010)

This is a work produced by Ming Wong, a 3-channel HD digital video installation, uses screens suspended in air, as well as a video screen mounted into a wall. The suspended screens give the impression of space irrelevant to the physical gallery space, and that of a distance and memory. The story is told through 2 main screens, with the video of the artist playing piano for sound track, on third.

Cornerhouse [2010] Unspooling - Artists & Cinema [Online] http://www.cornerhouse.org/art/info.aspx?ID=417&page=53000 [18/11/2010]
Wong, M. [2010] Life and Death in Venice /Leben und Tod in Venedig /Vita e Morte a Venezia. [Online] http://www.mingwong.org/index.php?/cv/life--death-in-venice-/ [18/11/2010]