Going forth with my research, I started looking specifically for digital animation art pieces to familiarise myself with animation's possibilities. I stumbled upon the Everything Forever virtual exhibition which was showcasing digital artworks and I came across Lea Porre's work.
I watched the piece she made about Louis XVI's decapitation, re writing the course of events and turning them into a myth. The minimalism and surrealism in the animation was really inspiring for me because it creates this post apocalyptic ambience with a strong element of futurism.
I watched the piece she made about Louis XVI's decapitation, re writing the course of events and turning them into a myth. The minimalism and surrealism in the animation was really inspiring for me because it creates this post apocalyptic ambience with a strong element of futurism.
Long before watching this piece I was thinking about how it would be if everything real and material was digital.
I wrote a short stream of consciousness about these thoughts because I can't detangle them and put them in order to make them make sense.
How would it be if we could upload our brains, memories on the cloud? We will idolise the digital Jesus, a simulacrum of what was material spirituality.
Everything is a binary code interacting in an endless loop of controlled connections.
Signifiers of things that used to be real and tangible. A clipart photo of a monkey holding a banana now replaces the embodied physical state. Digital buttons, futurism, human relations now overlapping each other in web junk.
Swimming amongst web junk, cursed images, the hidden side of society, the obscene. Sinking in nodes and algorithms, one icon prevails, the digital Jesus.
Humans will immortalise every neurone connection in a Cloud storage. Every time the cell breathes, a connection is made, data is submitted in the neurones of a massive computer, receiving and generating messages. This computer is the digital Jesus, transcending all barriers of materiality and spirituality. The machine holding everything together, giving infinite power so that the servers work flawlessly. Divine power, a divine light moving the world around.
Everything exists in a hard drive, impulses, beliefs, everything is happening in 01.
Physical bodies exist as material vessels holding the information in place. But if the digital body is to be moved, go on a trip for instance, only the digital footprint will be real. The material body will remain in its original location. The mind plant. A massive space with beds filled with material vessels, only to be plugged in at birth and plugged out when death comes.
I wrote a short stream of consciousness about these thoughts because I can't detangle them and put them in order to make them make sense.
How would it be if we could upload our brains, memories on the cloud? We will idolise the digital Jesus, a simulacrum of what was material spirituality.
Everything is a binary code interacting in an endless loop of controlled connections.
Signifiers of things that used to be real and tangible. A clipart photo of a monkey holding a banana now replaces the embodied physical state. Digital buttons, futurism, human relations now overlapping each other in web junk.
Swimming amongst web junk, cursed images, the hidden side of society, the obscene. Sinking in nodes and algorithms, one icon prevails, the digital Jesus.
Humans will immortalise every neurone connection in a Cloud storage. Every time the cell breathes, a connection is made, data is submitted in the neurones of a massive computer, receiving and generating messages. This computer is the digital Jesus, transcending all barriers of materiality and spirituality. The machine holding everything together, giving infinite power so that the servers work flawlessly. Divine power, a divine light moving the world around.
Everything exists in a hard drive, impulses, beliefs, everything is happening in 01.
Physical bodies exist as material vessels holding the information in place. But if the digital body is to be moved, go on a trip for instance, only the digital footprint will be real. The material body will remain in its original location. The mind plant. A massive space with beds filled with material vessels, only to be plugged in at birth and plugged out when death comes.
SHADOWBANNED by Jon Rafman expands on these dystopian ideas, while incorporating the person sitting in front of the computer. After watching the film I felt that he just expressed all these ideas that I had in my head in video format. I have always been a fan of his work and I reckon that the narration gives a new dimension to the visual. I tend to work in a similar way in the sense that I rely on creative writing to give my films a plot. I've also noticed that most cgi artist films deal with a very alienating and dystopian feeling which is something that I want to explore more. One good example of this exact topic is Keiken's Battle of Reality where humans have entered the Metaverse, a decentralised system, where they're only perceived as vessels of notions like beauty, loss and transformation.
These thoughts have led me to look online for any new churches/cults that relate to that. The search has been a bit unfruitful but I've expanded my search in transhumanism, secular humanism and other key words relating to the transcendence of the body. The book Sensorium embodied experience, technology and contemporary art by Caroline A. Jones provided me with a more expanded view on the matter, especially on some terms and what they mean in art terms.
Moreover, the book The Cyborg Experiments: The Extensions of the Body in the Media Age by Joanna Zylinska gave me a better understanding on transhumanism and on what cyborgs might actually look like. Zylinska compares Orlan to Stelarc to their approach to the term; Orlan in transforming the body and enduring the pain to alter the outside image and Stelarc in amplifying nature through soft prosthetics that extend the human capabilities. Although I've read some harsh critiques on Stelarc's approach and ideas, I believe that he was a pioneer in that period that he started making the prosthetics.
After a very insightful conversation with Jennet Thomas about the 'I looked at Myself, and Myself stared back at me' film that I produced for the Interim show, I started thinking about what I would like to see visually and expand the story. For the construction of the plot I decided to use the myth of the Minotaur, to add an element of my own cultural background .
The film will not be a take on the myth, like Lea Porre's work. Instead, the main idea will be the same, the dual self/ alter ego and the myth will serve as a narrative to connect the two main characters and give them some purpose. I picked the part of Theseus going to kill the Minotaur with the help of Ariadne, daughter of the Minotaur's parents, to end the sacrifice tribute.
The characters are corresponding to Theseus, Ariadne and the Minotaur as such:
Red hair character: Minotaur, the evil force that needs to be eliminated/ the false self
White hair character: Theseus, the one who goes on the journey/ the true self
Statue/Empress: Ariadne/ the mediator between the two universes where the red and white characters exist/ she helps Theseus win the Minotaur by giving him a red yarn thread to not get lost inside the labyrinth.
This is a way to connect the original video and add more to it contextually and visually. I plan to replace the head of the red character with a 3D head of a bull so that it is a blend of animation and film.
Due to geographic reasons, Olga Papadima, who plays the Ariadne character, will not be here to shoot some new sequences so I will make a face scan of her head like I did with mine. When I browsed Sketchfab to find a free 3D body to attach the head, I found a 3D scan of Aphrodite holding the golden apple so I will use that as the body of the Empress. Although I am not familiar with any of the programs that I have to use to make all these, I am looking forward to experiment with them, as it is something that I really want to learn.
The film will not be a take on the myth, like Lea Porre's work. Instead, the main idea will be the same, the dual self/ alter ego and the myth will serve as a narrative to connect the two main characters and give them some purpose. I picked the part of Theseus going to kill the Minotaur with the help of Ariadne, daughter of the Minotaur's parents, to end the sacrifice tribute.
The characters are corresponding to Theseus, Ariadne and the Minotaur as such:
Red hair character: Minotaur, the evil force that needs to be eliminated/ the false self
White hair character: Theseus, the one who goes on the journey/ the true self
Statue/Empress: Ariadne/ the mediator between the two universes where the red and white characters exist/ she helps Theseus win the Minotaur by giving him a red yarn thread to not get lost inside the labyrinth.
This is a way to connect the original video and add more to it contextually and visually. I plan to replace the head of the red character with a 3D head of a bull so that it is a blend of animation and film.
Due to geographic reasons, Olga Papadima, who plays the Ariadne character, will not be here to shoot some new sequences so I will make a face scan of her head like I did with mine. When I browsed Sketchfab to find a free 3D body to attach the head, I found a 3D scan of Aphrodite holding the golden apple so I will use that as the body of the Empress. Although I am not familiar with any of the programs that I have to use to make all these, I am looking forward to experiment with them, as it is something that I really want to learn.
When I was trying to think about how I will incorporate the bull head and the red character I came across the Minotaur costume and mask of Harrison Birtwistle's opera. It's very clever since with the mask not transparent the audience wouldn't be able to see the performer and since my model of the bull was missing the back bit I decided to insert the red head inside so that it doesn't look so bad.
A friend suggested that I look into the metaphoric meaning of the myth and I was surprised to see that the meaning of it kind of reinforces the original idea of the dual self. In particular, the Minotaur symbolises the double nature of the human, the animalistic side that is hidden inside. The journey inside the labyrinth symbolises the quest to find these primal instincts and so the death of the "monster" is the acceptance of this secondary nature/side of the self. By the end of this quest, we see a man free and aware of this struggle.
I believe that the choice I made with these themes relates to my own struggles with how I express my identity. I've always felt that depending on my appearance, my sense of self also changes resulting in what seems to be like three different people. The major changes I went through with my appearance can be categorised in my natural brunette, bleach blonde and red self. I believe that they also symbolise my evolution as a person and coming to terms with what I want to achieve in life.
There is no particular reason why I chose the alter ego to be my "current" self, I thought that it would have a very strong visual impact with the set and the costume I decided and the ego which is dressed in white is inspired by the classic portrayal of the good, the angelic and the clean.
I believe that the choice I made with these themes relates to my own struggles with how I express my identity. I've always felt that depending on my appearance, my sense of self also changes resulting in what seems to be like three different people. The major changes I went through with my appearance can be categorised in my natural brunette, bleach blonde and red self. I believe that they also symbolise my evolution as a person and coming to terms with what I want to achieve in life.
There is no particular reason why I chose the alter ego to be my "current" self, I thought that it would have a very strong visual impact with the set and the costume I decided and the ego which is dressed in white is inspired by the classic portrayal of the good, the angelic and the clean.
As for the sound, in the first film I felt that it was the element that set the mood so I decided to create theme sounds for these three main characters.
For the red character I'm sticking with an ominous sound, mostly bassy and humming sounds.
For the white I made a sound that resonates with classical fairytales and cheery tones.
The sound of the Empress is the one I'm spending most of my time making because I want it to give off the feeling of a futuristic lab/church, something that feels very animation-like. I found out that Gregorian Chants when autotuned give off that angelic futuristic vibe.
For the labyrinth animations I wanted again something ominous and dark.
For the production of them, Jaime Martinez Lopez helped me compose them as I have no technical skills on sound production and was very important in the general editing process of the film because he understands exactly what I want to portray and we have had a strong creative and collaborative relationship since the second year of the university.
In terms of the collaboration process I believe that we make a very interesting combination as I am more chaotic in my way of working and I always want to achieve a very strong and colourful image, whereas he is more interested in more minimalistic and clean images so we create the perfect balance.
For the red character I'm sticking with an ominous sound, mostly bassy and humming sounds.
For the white I made a sound that resonates with classical fairytales and cheery tones.
The sound of the Empress is the one I'm spending most of my time making because I want it to give off the feeling of a futuristic lab/church, something that feels very animation-like. I found out that Gregorian Chants when autotuned give off that angelic futuristic vibe.
For the labyrinth animations I wanted again something ominous and dark.
For the production of them, Jaime Martinez Lopez helped me compose them as I have no technical skills on sound production and was very important in the general editing process of the film because he understands exactly what I want to portray and we have had a strong creative and collaborative relationship since the second year of the university.
In terms of the collaboration process I believe that we make a very interesting combination as I am more chaotic in my way of working and I always want to achieve a very strong and colourful image, whereas he is more interested in more minimalistic and clean images so we create the perfect balance.
Elliot Dodd's talk at the Art & Life series helped me a lot to visualise how I could make such scenes that combine animation and moving image. In particular, he showed a film that he made as part of his degree show which portrays roughly what I want to achieve.
When producing the film I felt that every movie or series I watched in that period was influencing me a lot because each one gave me a different perspective on the use of colour, how surrealism can be interpreted and how narrative can be used to construct/deconstruct a story.
Saturated colours are a fundamental part of the film, especially red, white and green; red being the key colour of the "bad" character, the yarn that the white character uses to find her way through the labyrinth, white for the good character and the statue that is the mediator of the two main characters (marble white) and green for the labyrinth/garden sequences.
Pedro Almodovar's film All About My Mother introduced me to a new way of understanding colour conceptually and visually. After watching it I felt that the plot was almost secondary, the whole film being an exploration of different reds interacting with each other. I rely a lot on the visual part of everything and I believe that this is a perfect example of how carefully curated colours can reinforce a storyline all together.
Saturated colours are a fundamental part of the film, especially red, white and green; red being the key colour of the "bad" character, the yarn that the white character uses to find her way through the labyrinth, white for the good character and the statue that is the mediator of the two main characters (marble white) and green for the labyrinth/garden sequences.
Pedro Almodovar's film All About My Mother introduced me to a new way of understanding colour conceptually and visually. After watching it I felt that the plot was almost secondary, the whole film being an exploration of different reds interacting with each other. I rely a lot on the visual part of everything and I believe that this is a perfect example of how carefully curated colours can reinforce a storyline all together.
In terms of surrealism, there were a few pieces that gave me more insight on how surrealist film making can have a very clear and understandable structure.
Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters by Paul Schrader is a film about one of the most important writers of Japan. The film encompasses fact, fiction and memories in a really interesting way; the last years of the writer's life are portrayed in colour in everyday Japan, his childhood memories in black and white, and some segments of his books in very bright, colourful, intricate sets. The reason why his books are included is because he usually projected himself in some of the characters so the fiction parts were kind of the surrealist approach to what was happening in his life and his views on different matters. My favourite part was the 'Kyoko's house' adaptation which took place in a very 80s futuristic set with very bright purples and pinks. The book is about four different people who represent four different sides of Mishima's character: his athletic side appears as a boxer, his artistic side as a painter, his narcissistic, performing side as an actor and his secretive, nihilistic side as a businessman who goes through the motions of living a normal life while practicing "absolute contempt for reality". Unfortunately it hasn't been translated in English so I can only read summaries about it.
Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters by Paul Schrader is a film about one of the most important writers of Japan. The film encompasses fact, fiction and memories in a really interesting way; the last years of the writer's life are portrayed in colour in everyday Japan, his childhood memories in black and white, and some segments of his books in very bright, colourful, intricate sets. The reason why his books are included is because he usually projected himself in some of the characters so the fiction parts were kind of the surrealist approach to what was happening in his life and his views on different matters. My favourite part was the 'Kyoko's house' adaptation which took place in a very 80s futuristic set with very bright purples and pinks. The book is about four different people who represent four different sides of Mishima's character: his athletic side appears as a boxer, his artistic side as a painter, his narcissistic, performing side as an actor and his secretive, nihilistic side as a businessman who goes through the motions of living a normal life while practicing "absolute contempt for reality". Unfortunately it hasn't been translated in English so I can only read summaries about it.
Moreover, I stumbled upon the anime series Mononoke, produced in 2007, which is about a mysterious medicine seller in feudal Japan who hunts down evil spirits known as mononoke. When I watched it I was surprised because it has a really strong vintage feel to it, the character design looked like it was from the early 90s but what interested me the most was the allegories for these mononoke and the mind blowing sets. Each mononoke was manifested in a completely different way and it had multiple forms which gave me a different perspective on how themes can be interpreted. The sets were so visually rich that they almost disorient the viewer from what is happening but if I could I would build similar sets for my films in real life.
I have discovered many artists through the Daata platform who have a different approach to video art, from more diy films to high end 3D animation. I try to visit it as much as possible to expand my source of stimulation and forget about the 'traditional' film making (with proper cast, plot etc).
Jeremy Couillard's 'Tad Mol, The Inventor of the Letter G' is similar to what I hoped to achieve with my film. I really admire the way he managed to blend handmade animation, 3D, moving image with different styles all together. The plot itself is playful as well, it is about a couple that drinks an energy drink advertised by a shaman type figure and they enter an adventure in a mechanical universe created by the shaman. This is the level of work I want to be able to produce in the future and I feel that it will suit me because I'm all about weird visuals and playfulness.
Jeremy Couillard's 'Tad Mol, The Inventor of the Letter G' is similar to what I hoped to achieve with my film. I really admire the way he managed to blend handmade animation, 3D, moving image with different styles all together. The plot itself is playful as well, it is about a couple that drinks an energy drink advertised by a shaman type figure and they enter an adventure in a mechanical universe created by the shaman. This is the level of work I want to be able to produce in the future and I feel that it will suit me because I'm all about weird visuals and playfulness.
The older work of the AES+F collective 'Apollo Inspiring an Epic Poet' reminded me of my visual processes when I was doing my mood boards for the film. I really like the fact that when you look at the drawings from far, you only see abstract patterns and colours but when you see closer you see the ancient mythical print. It also reminds me of a colouring book I had when I was a kid that was about the 12 labours of Hercules. Since I was quite young at the time I didn't bother colouring the entire picture or stay within the lines which is a similarity with this piece of work.
After I finished the film I realised that some of the shots resemble some sequences of Maya Deren's Meshes of the Afternoon. I had seen it before I started making the film but I find it very exciting when you realise there is something almost identical to what you've done which reenforces the idea of collective unconsciousness and art being something innate in all humans.
Because I've been inside the house for a long time, whenever I sit in the living room I look at a mono print I made last year. One night I thought that it would be very interesting to make an animation out of it because I envision a lot of movement in it. The best option would be to turn it into a VR space but that would be something to do in the future. It would be a good project to experiment with surrealism in a new context.
Alexis Akrithakis is a Greek painter that was very famous for his Arte Povera and Actionism inspired paintings. Even though I wasn't familiar with his work at all when I was making the mono prints, I can see some resemblances in the shapes and the general feel of them. For me they are more Pop Art than Arte Povera, especially since he was collaborating with Alexander Iolas who was very involved with the Pop Art movement.
Moreover, I believe that Akrithakis is a good visual reference for my film as well. If I had to visualise in sketches the elements of the film I would draw them in this style. They contain child-like naivety which is so rich visually.
Alexis Akrithakis is a Greek painter that was very famous for his Arte Povera and Actionism inspired paintings. Even though I wasn't familiar with his work at all when I was making the mono prints, I can see some resemblances in the shapes and the general feel of them. For me they are more Pop Art than Arte Povera, especially since he was collaborating with Alexander Iolas who was very involved with the Pop Art movement.
Moreover, I believe that Akrithakis is a good visual reference for my film as well. If I had to visualise in sketches the elements of the film I would draw them in this style. They contain child-like naivety which is so rich visually.
When I saw the painting on the left with the bird and the suitcase, it reminded me of a specific chapter of Hirohiko Araki's Jojo's Bizarre Adventure manga which was in a completely different art style, as it was a comic book that one character owned. Each illustration is both "scary" and camp with the same child naivety and symbolism that Akrithakis had.
I like the fact that I've been revisiting previous work of mine and looking at it from a different perspective and in different materials. I believe that it really helped me throughout the last lockdown because I felt that I didn't have the outside stimulation that I needed to come up with new ideas.
TOP 10 INFLUENCES
- Ryan Trecartin: I am a big fan of his approach in everything, and I remember when I first saw one of his films when I didn't know who he was and I was amazed by his style.
- Guy Ben Ner's Berkeley’s Island: When I first saw that film it helped me understand how simple effects and tricks can add to the film visually and conceptually.
- Lu Yang: I love her oversaturated approach in all of her works as explained further down below and I hope one day I will produce similar 3D works.
- Joanne Finkelstein's The Art of Self Invention : Image and Identity in Popular Visual Culture: this book helped me a lot when I was doing my MCP and it provided a lot of insight about identity and how it is shaped through popular culture.
- E-Flux journal The Internet Doesn't Exist: even though I couldn't understand some of the chapters because they deal with future scenarios and intricate ideas, I feel that it gave me a boost when thinking about virtuality and what happens in a world oversaturated with internet.
- Nathalie Nguyen: She is an upcoming visual artist who has her own brand. She started creating some fantasy shoes that were rendered in real fashion shoots and then other digital animations and prints to accommodate her brand, Happy99. I admire her style which resembles video game characters and her use of different methods like 2D animation and some real actors.
- Remixing Persona: An Imaginary Digital Media Object from the Onto-Tales of the Digital Afterlife: I stumbled upon this ebook when researching for the MCP and it is a free creative book about personas. The text is very scarce but the images and the layout make it an interesting art book, every spread looks like a standalone piece. I was also pleased to see that it was free for anyone to download and distribute.
- Jacolby Satterwhite: Reifying Desire is one of my favourite works of him because it is so rich visually and conceptually. The fact that he used his mother's drawings as semiotics is really interesting since it is no longer only about body expression in virtuality but it has this very intimate and meditative aspect.
- Somnath Bhatt: spreading across graphic design and digital, he creates powerful pieces that encompass beautifully his Indian identity. I have always admired Indian and Asian religious art because they are both so rich. I am not sure if he is a coding artist but this code-like approach gives a fresh feeling at the classical looking figures.
- Rachel Maclean: I love her surrealist approach in all of her works especially all the ultra girly imagery on her website. She has created a specific fairytale/fantasy that is her trademark and through that she makes comments on female political issues. She also helped me understand how powerful is our body when performing all these different characters since in most of her work she's the only actor.
For my MCP I chose to write about how we perform multiple identities online and then how we continue to perform them offline as well, so I was looking into identity politics, social media and virtuality.
Along the way, I looked into artists like Ryan Trecartin and Gazira Babeli, who were, I believe, a direct influence in my latest film.
This helped me to keep the digital momentum from my last project to continue working with digital media. I was already thinking that I would like to make a short film, but I struggled with coming up with a proper script as I didn't know what I wanted it to be about.
I really like Trecartin's I-Be Area because it is the perfect representation of popular culture and camp. I admire the excess that surrounds every single scene and after watching a couple of interviews I understood that it was mostly based on improvisation both in acting and in post production when stitching everything together. So I started making physical "mood boards" to sketch out environments or characters that I would like to have in the film. I chose to not have a clear narration and storyline and to include pieces of creative writing. I reckon this was the Lynchian effect influencing me because I always admired the structure of the red room sequences in Twin Peaks. I also knew from the start that I wanted to try to scan the face of the main character and animate it spinning around, so it was the perfect change to acquire more skills in 3D programs.
Along the way, I looked into artists like Ryan Trecartin and Gazira Babeli, who were, I believe, a direct influence in my latest film.
This helped me to keep the digital momentum from my last project to continue working with digital media. I was already thinking that I would like to make a short film, but I struggled with coming up with a proper script as I didn't know what I wanted it to be about.
I really like Trecartin's I-Be Area because it is the perfect representation of popular culture and camp. I admire the excess that surrounds every single scene and after watching a couple of interviews I understood that it was mostly based on improvisation both in acting and in post production when stitching everything together. So I started making physical "mood boards" to sketch out environments or characters that I would like to have in the film. I chose to not have a clear narration and storyline and to include pieces of creative writing. I reckon this was the Lynchian effect influencing me because I always admired the structure of the red room sequences in Twin Peaks. I also knew from the start that I wanted to try to scan the face of the main character and animate it spinning around, so it was the perfect change to acquire more skills in 3D programs.
The spoken word piece that I decided to use as the main (only) clear narration came from a creative writing exercise that I did in autumn, and the written piece came from a mono print that I had done last year and named "I looked at myself and myself stared back at me" (can be seen in Artworks tab). Upon that choice I decided that it was going to be me enacting the main characters, partly because I wanted to try the idea of different personas and partly because I didn't have a basic structure to present to someone else.
I also had the constraint of travelling back to Athens, meaning that I couldn't borrow any equipment from the university.
While I was in Athens I did a brainstorming session about the film with a friend of mine to see how it would be experienced from someone else. She assisted me throughout the whole process to shoot the scenes and she can be seen as the only other character in the film as well. As I was working on it I realised that it was going to be a comment on the duality of identity and the way it is usually represented in popular culture: the mean alter ego, luring the good one into its lair and trying to eliminate it. The written piece was itself about duality and the need to separate a section of the self that is unrecognisable.
All the sequences were shot on my phone with a basic phone tripod, a borrowed green screen fabric and three studio lights. In my view, the most important sequence was the first because I had a clear vision that I wanted it to be in my friend's grandma's house because it had this baroque, gothic style to it. Generally speaking, I had to twitch and change some of the scenes due to different constraints but I believe it all worked out in the end. My approach to editing was like a visual sketch since I didn't have a concrete script. I had quite a few transition scenes that added to the surrealist aspect of it and sound was the element that would piece everything together.
I also had the constraint of travelling back to Athens, meaning that I couldn't borrow any equipment from the university.
While I was in Athens I did a brainstorming session about the film with a friend of mine to see how it would be experienced from someone else. She assisted me throughout the whole process to shoot the scenes and she can be seen as the only other character in the film as well. As I was working on it I realised that it was going to be a comment on the duality of identity and the way it is usually represented in popular culture: the mean alter ego, luring the good one into its lair and trying to eliminate it. The written piece was itself about duality and the need to separate a section of the self that is unrecognisable.
All the sequences were shot on my phone with a basic phone tripod, a borrowed green screen fabric and three studio lights. In my view, the most important sequence was the first because I had a clear vision that I wanted it to be in my friend's grandma's house because it had this baroque, gothic style to it. Generally speaking, I had to twitch and change some of the scenes due to different constraints but I believe it all worked out in the end. My approach to editing was like a visual sketch since I didn't have a concrete script. I had quite a few transition scenes that added to the surrealist aspect of it and sound was the element that would piece everything together.
Some of my inspiration for the 3D objects in the film were Jon Rafman's Dream Journal, Gazira Babeli's body of works and Lu Yang's Delusional Mandala.
The direct influence of Dream Journal was a scene where a woman's head was spinning around and the camera then enters a different world through her eye.
I tried using several free software that do 3D scanning and with my limited skills in these programs I managed to produce a simple head scan, but in the future I would like to get it done professionally. The thrill of immortalising yourself in digital was amazing and really fun because it stops being something literally embodied and it can be manipulated in different ways.
Lu Yang's Delusional Mandala is exactly about this. The artist immortalised herself in digital to 'not harm others', enduring several procedures that aggravate delusions, thinking about religion, science and the human consciousness.
The direct influence of Dream Journal was a scene where a woman's head was spinning around and the camera then enters a different world through her eye.
I tried using several free software that do 3D scanning and with my limited skills in these programs I managed to produce a simple head scan, but in the future I would like to get it done professionally. The thrill of immortalising yourself in digital was amazing and really fun because it stops being something literally embodied and it can be manipulated in different ways.
Lu Yang's Delusional Mandala is exactly about this. The artist immortalised herself in digital to 'not harm others', enduring several procedures that aggravate delusions, thinking about religion, science and the human consciousness.
Gazira Babeli is also very interesting as an artist, because she only exists virtually, in Second Life. Nobody knows her true identity but her Second Life performances have been critically acclaimed and she has participated in real life exhibitions as well. What I like about her is that she sees her identity as a work in progress that is informed by the audience. In "Buy Gaz' 4 One Linden Dollar" she was selling the exact same outfit as her to the audience, filling the room with replicas of her and thus escaping the boundary of the physical body and making identity something that can be performed through others as well.
Another interesting initiative I found while researching is the Hereafter Institute, a project launched at LACMA. One could book an appointment which a consultant about what will happen to his digital fingerprint after he passes. This included whole body 3D scanning and memory preservation in material objects. Again, the immortalisation of ourselves seems to be a theme that is still explored opening up a lot of possibilities.
Seeing how the pandemic had affected my studies and how everything is moving in virtual, I started thinking that the next step for me would be to move to digital mediums because you can communicate the idea of the piece however you want it to be perceived. Pictures of paintings and sculptures on a website wouldn't do the job for me and since I always wanted to try 3D modelling and VR, I started researching.
I saw that a friend of mine got a residency at a new platform where you can create unique pieces of work through training your own Artificial Intelligence algorithm, without knowing how to code. As soon as I saw it I asked them how it works and started thinking about how I could utilise its functions. The first thing that came to mind was how much we were forced to rely in digital communication in lockdown, and how important friendships were for the mental health of each individual.
I saw that a friend of mine got a residency at a new platform where you can create unique pieces of work through training your own Artificial Intelligence algorithm, without knowing how to code. As soon as I saw it I asked them how it works and started thinking about how I could utilise its functions. The first thing that came to mind was how much we were forced to rely in digital communication in lockdown, and how important friendships were for the mental health of each individual.
As a person who creates and enacts their identity through human interactions, I explored how this blend of influences and connections can be translated through the feedback loops of a machine, which seems to have completely taken over our lives. Our bodies have become digital carriers of relations, feelings and memories, but how is essence transmitted through an interactive screen? This project would pose and answer this question by transcending the constraints of reality and humanity, unveiling a layer of the ghost in the machine and giving it the freedom to imagine and create by its own laws.
Firstly, to start training I needed a collection of 30+ photos, so I messaged my closest friends and family members that have influenced me throughout my life and asked them if they wanted to send me two selfies of them with no constraints as to if it should be a serious headshot or a filter selfie. In the mix of the pictures I added some photos of myself throughout the years to add in the transition of myself as the effect of my interaction with them. I had no idea how the results would look like since I read that the more you train it with credits, the better the results are. I imagined the results being photorealistic faces made from all the individual pictures creating a weird unified morph but I stopped training the algorithm at a point where even 3 hours of training would make very little difference in the outcome. The reason behind my aspiration for photorealistic results stems from https://thispersondoesnotexist.com which is an AI algorithm that generates a different face of a person that doesn't exist in real time, with each refresh of the page.
Firstly, to start training I needed a collection of 30+ photos, so I messaged my closest friends and family members that have influenced me throughout my life and asked them if they wanted to send me two selfies of them with no constraints as to if it should be a serious headshot or a filter selfie. In the mix of the pictures I added some photos of myself throughout the years to add in the transition of myself as the effect of my interaction with them. I had no idea how the results would look like since I read that the more you train it with credits, the better the results are. I imagined the results being photorealistic faces made from all the individual pictures creating a weird unified morph but I stopped training the algorithm at a point where even 3 hours of training would make very little difference in the outcome. The reason behind my aspiration for photorealistic results stems from https://thispersondoesnotexist.com which is an AI algorithm that generates a different face of a person that doesn't exist in real time, with each refresh of the page.
I was very pleased to see this creative "incest" of different people and I was really struck by the textures the AI produced upon its own will. I noticed that the platform provided another action where one could choose several of the results and through AI again a short video is generated that morphs from one result to the other. That was the intended look of the final presentation that I was aiming for so I made a couple of short videos, as well as manual documentation of some specific images that I liked. The very first "snapshot" generated was literally just pixel colours and as more snapshots were generated, new forms appeared.
As for the presentation, the initial idea would be a triple projection in a dark square space with sound. The layout of the videos would be two identical progress videos on the left and right and in the middle would be the main video. Due to some limitations that I had in the dark space of the studio I sticked with a double projection which was quite interesting in the end. For sound, I resorted to my favourite freesounds.org to find a gloomy sound that could be heard as something shifting to something else.
As for the presentation, the initial idea would be a triple projection in a dark square space with sound. The layout of the videos would be two identical progress videos on the left and right and in the middle would be the main video. Due to some limitations that I had in the dark space of the studio I sticked with a double projection which was quite interesting in the end. For sound, I resorted to my favourite freesounds.org to find a gloomy sound that could be heard as something shifting to something else.
I recently got two commissions to make a painting with neon signs attached on it and to create a lamp from neon pieces.
For the painting I'm going for a gestural approach with limited colours and the neon pieces will follow some of the forms of the painting and some others will add extra elements on the painting. I believe this will be a creative challenge for me as the neon can stand on its own and it has its own luminosity which demands a balance between the painting and the sculptural aspect. This will help me understand better the combination of sculptural elements within the traditional painting domain.
My inspiration for the painting is Franz Kline's work because it has a very strong gestural element. Simple yet sufficient, his brushstrokes seem to be exactly in the place they should be and they create multidimensional images within.
For the painting I'm going for a gestural approach with limited colours and the neon pieces will follow some of the forms of the painting and some others will add extra elements on the painting. I believe this will be a creative challenge for me as the neon can stand on its own and it has its own luminosity which demands a balance between the painting and the sculptural aspect. This will help me understand better the combination of sculptural elements within the traditional painting domain.
My inspiration for the painting is Franz Kline's work because it has a very strong gestural element. Simple yet sufficient, his brushstrokes seem to be exactly in the place they should be and they create multidimensional images within.
For the painting I took an image of some rocks in the sea and I tried to follow the path of minimalism, meaning that I translated the elements of the picture in lines and blocks of colour. Below is the picture that I decided to use as reference.
For the second commission, I am planning to make a lamp that will hang from the ceiling and it will be a sphere made out of different colours and shapes of neon and at the bottom the pieces of neon will look like they are dripping down. I have the opportunity to collaborate with a neon artist that used to make Chryssa's pieces which I admire. I think this will be an opportunity to work with greek artists and support the person that contributed to an important part of the greek art cultured history.
Another project that I've been focusing on is gathering static video stills of my everyday life during the quarantine. I did it mainly to stay active and to familiarise myself with video work. I believe that the final video could go on and on so I have the creative authority to end it whenever I want.
As part of the sound, I decided to change almost none of the sounds that already exist in the videos because I reckon that they set the mood of that particular environment. Most of them were very ambient which adds another dimension on the theme of isolation and enclosure, kind of like a gap in the everyday hectic lifestyle.
I considered the alternative of having a spoken word over it which will be a dream-like sequence. I chose the dream sequence because I like the contrast of being guided into a different ambient space and looking at something that is not necessarily that ambient.
As part of the sound, I decided to change almost none of the sounds that already exist in the videos because I reckon that they set the mood of that particular environment. Most of them were very ambient which adds another dimension on the theme of isolation and enclosure, kind of like a gap in the everyday hectic lifestyle.
I considered the alternative of having a spoken word over it which will be a dream-like sequence. I chose the dream sequence because I like the contrast of being guided into a different ambient space and looking at something that is not necessarily that ambient.
For the final form of the video, I added delay effect on my spoken word piece and turned the volume down significantly because I liked the effect of it being like a whisper. It reminded me of guided meditation tracks which have that particular sound which is supposed to be reaching to the subconscious.
An inspiration for this was Glenn Harrold's deep sleep hypnosis album because he uses a kind of delay effect. I listened to that album in the past and it really struck me because at some point I was half asleep and suddenly it was like I heard his voice ringing in my brain, not a sound coming in from my ears.
An inspiration for this was Glenn Harrold's deep sleep hypnosis album because he uses a kind of delay effect. I listened to that album in the past and it really struck me because at some point I was half asleep and suddenly it was like I heard his voice ringing in my brain, not a sound coming in from my ears.
A video that influenced me to do mine was Bill Viola's I Don't Know What It Is I Am Like, which is an hour long compilation of footage from nature and animals. I like how a narrative is created by unrelated at first sight clips. They all encompass a stillness and ambience in them. I always admired the epic style of Bill Voila's video work because they allow the viewer to take in everything that is going on.
|
Another piece of work that had an impact on me was Dimitris Papaioannou's INSIDE. It is a six hour long video which has no middle part and no end. The piece was shown in a theatre and people cold walk in and watch for as long as they wanted. It was also done in one shot which didn't force anything to the viewer, since we always see edited footage that is adjusted to our short term attention-span.Instead, this piece shows everything that is going on and the slow speed adds an extra note of ambience and calmness. For me, it revealed how ritualistic everyday activities are within the home space. Life is a small miracle and we forget how unique each action we do is. I believe that it was related to the quarantine as well, as we were all forced to stay inside and it made me realise the notion of just existing and surviving. It made me think that everyday I just survived another day, nothing changed, I just carried on doing my everyday basic activities such as taking a shower, eating and sleeping.
Growing up, I was always looking for the small details of the city that make it so characteristic, whether that was individuals or objects thrown out in the street. Living in a metropolis gives one the chance to just observe how people survive in a jungle of grey buildings and how different that is from city to city. In this sphere of observing and giving feedback to what we see, active archeology comes in play. By collecting stills from the urban lifestyle, we immortalise each moment in time. I am currently planning a project where I will revisit my father’s village in Greece and work as an active archeologist. In particular, I will photograph all the remnants of an old and different way of living in the context of today.Observing and capturing what is left over after many years and how different is the everyday life of farmers and especially the life of people who were there from the beginning, the seniors that witnessed their neighbours and children leaving the village to move to the city for a better future and career. In this way I will pay homage to my heritage and also try to rejuvenate this version of reality in Greece. Along this process I’m hoping to find how I relate to this environment as well as how this will feed my artistic practice.
Left: my grandparents from Epirus , Right: my father at a wedding in the village
Because of the lockdown my plan to shoot the lifestyle of my father's village but I tried to stay active and experiment with different things. In particular, I did some experiments with my scanner to explore different textures within the digital spectre. I believe that the outcome had a spiritual nuance and it explored my relationship with my mother (first three pictures) and with my own childhood.
Chino Otsuka took this theme and transformed it into beautiful images where she inserted her adult self in photos of her childhood. Through this " imagine finding me" series, she explores the themes of cultural and displacement as she is narrating her past and present life simultaneously. Every time I see my old photos I wonder if back then I had imagined myself like that and I wish I could go back and tell myself that I have chosen the right path and I don't need to be so anxious about my future life and where I stand in this world.
In terms of exploring my childhood, I searched through the dolls I had in the attic and I became fascinated with the tiny scale of some Barbie objects like tiny pencils, soaps, notebooks with actual paper pages. I decided to make small sets with these just to kind of play again with my dolls as an adult. My mother's first reaction was "I can't believe you're playing with dolls again". I was always very careful with my dolls though, and I never lost any object. I remember that most of my play time was just creating the set and dressing up the dolls and I didn't spend as much time actually playing with them.
I visited a few exhibitions that gave me a lot of inspiration in terms of how to use different materials.
I saw the works of Emily Young who uses different semi precious stones to create sometimes massive statues.The reason why I loved her carvings is that she kept the untamed nature of the stones and they all felt like they were slashed by a lightning, leaving only a few parts intact. These pieces were important to me because some of them were casted in patinated bronze and a few days ago I was thinking of casting my stone carvings in bronze to explore how textures would come out in a shiny material.
I like the roughness and boldness of the semi precious stones but for me, working with such expensive materials kind of narrows down the field of experimentation because you can't start making something on the spot. You need to know beforehand what you are going to make and that doesn't leave a lot of space for accidental creation. It was also interesting to check out the artist's background which was obviously very rich and elitist. She comes from a family of politicians, writers and artists which "predicts" that she was to be a really successful artist.
I saw the works of Emily Young who uses different semi precious stones to create sometimes massive statues.The reason why I loved her carvings is that she kept the untamed nature of the stones and they all felt like they were slashed by a lightning, leaving only a few parts intact. These pieces were important to me because some of them were casted in patinated bronze and a few days ago I was thinking of casting my stone carvings in bronze to explore how textures would come out in a shiny material.
I like the roughness and boldness of the semi precious stones but for me, working with such expensive materials kind of narrows down the field of experimentation because you can't start making something on the spot. You need to know beforehand what you are going to make and that doesn't leave a lot of space for accidental creation. It was also interesting to check out the artist's background which was obviously very rich and elitist. She comes from a family of politicians, writers and artists which "predicts" that she was to be a really successful artist.
A different approach of human nature was at the exhibition of Alina Szapocznikow. She explored themes of eroticism, mortality and violence through very industrialised materials such as different kinds of resins, fiberglass and photographs. I loved the lamp sculpture because it had a very fresh and playful aspect to it.
I liked how different mediums all blended together so beautifully, from the pictures of chewing gums to the fetished house decorations. I also liked how she had put objects inside the resins because they were like traces that were sometimes seen and sometimes lost in the material.
I liked how different mediums all blended together so beautifully, from the pictures of chewing gums to the fetished house decorations. I also liked how she had put objects inside the resins because they were like traces that were sometimes seen and sometimes lost in the material.
An idea that came to me after seeing Bram Bogart's pieces was that I could try to merge figurative painting with sculptural elements on the canvas. Most of his works weren't that memorable to me but what I took from it was his use of plaster on canvases. It had many plastic qualities to it as you can create different volumes and textures just by spreading and accumulating the plaster in different ways.
After completing my installation, when it was time for me to observe it as part of the audience, I realised that the sense it gave off was like a Morandi painting because of the muted colours and the inability to place everything in time and space. For me that was the element that made me "appreciate" the piece. I like his paintings because he combines aestheticism and realism in a beautiful way. It is remarkable how with only three tones and three different colours he was able to create so many textures. They are almost conceptual pieces rather than figurative.
Being back home after having all these thoughts about how to incorporate elements of my heritage in my works, changed the way I see some very simple everyday stuff. In particular, one day I was walking in central Athens and there was a lantern player on the street and hearing the sound of the lantern made me think about my relationship with this musical organ. Many years ago they were very famous up until the end of WWII, but now you can find very few lantern players only in some central streets in Athens and usually the people who own them have inherited them from grandparents and play them just to make some more money. I remember that since I was young, the sound of it really moved me even though I had no particular interest in traditional greek music. I liked how each owner had decorated them differently and how that music filled the whole street with a sometimes nostalgic and sometimes joyful music.
After this encounter, I decided to use one lantern song as a background noise for my project because I reckon that both the pieces of writing I've been doing and the stone sculptures have this kind of intrinsic nostalgia in them. I found two songs that I could use which make me personally emotional and they are both from a lantern composer called Nikos Armaos which were made in 1977.
After this encounter, I decided to use one lantern song as a background noise for my project because I reckon that both the pieces of writing I've been doing and the stone sculptures have this kind of intrinsic nostalgia in them. I found two songs that I could use which make me personally emotional and they are both from a lantern composer called Nikos Armaos which were made in 1977.
One night I saw a lantern player while running for the bus and I asked to take his picture but unfortunately something went wrong with the exposure but I like the effect of it.
When I was back in Athens I had the chance to see an exhibition of Lynda Benglis in the museum of Cycladic art and I believe that it was a really good decision to see it because she used many different materials and most of the works had a greek influence since she has lived in Greece before. Even though most of them had to do with her homeland in America I found so many common points with Greece especially the sun and the water.
I also believe that the curation of the exhibition was very well planned because all of the sculptures were harmoniously inhabiting the spaces. An element that the museum has added in previous exhibitions as well was that in some of the exhibition spaces they added some very small ancient artefacts.
I also believe that the curation of the exhibition was very well planned because all of the sculptures were harmoniously inhabiting the spaces. An element that the museum has added in previous exhibitions as well was that in some of the exhibition spaces they added some very small ancient artefacts.
Part of my research of the past month has been Art Brut and Cobra Art, which in my opinion have a lot of similarities even though their goals were different. Art brut was all about outsider art made by people who have no academic background and COBRA was about drawing inspiration from children's expression and spontaneity.
As part of my unit 6 practice I decided to experiment with completely new materials and concepts.
One of my experiments is with soft stones such as soapstone and pink alabaster. I liked the toughness and intensity of the material on its own so I intervene on the stones as little as possible. I haven't found the common ground of the stone sculptures in terms of contextual background but I believe that they all have to do with the coldness of the material in contrast to the carved object. Rigidness in contrast with the idea of something soft and smooth. The first carving I did was a small pillow which portrays exactly that contrast: a pillow should be soft and comfortable but it's stone cold.
After visiting the Kathy Wilkes pavilion in Venice, I realised that objects don't have to respond to the same exact theme to all work together as a composition. For example, Kathy Wilkes used many irrelevant objects but they all blended together under the theme of death, nostalgia and motherhood.
One of my experiments is with soft stones such as soapstone and pink alabaster. I liked the toughness and intensity of the material on its own so I intervene on the stones as little as possible. I haven't found the common ground of the stone sculptures in terms of contextual background but I believe that they all have to do with the coldness of the material in contrast to the carved object. Rigidness in contrast with the idea of something soft and smooth. The first carving I did was a small pillow which portrays exactly that contrast: a pillow should be soft and comfortable but it's stone cold.
After visiting the Kathy Wilkes pavilion in Venice, I realised that objects don't have to respond to the same exact theme to all work together as a composition. For example, Kathy Wilkes used many irrelevant objects but they all blended together under the theme of death, nostalgia and motherhood.
Some of my recent inspirations are Henry Moore and the early Cycladic art. I believe that both of them combine the element of abstraction with an almost equal dose of structuralism and freedom at the same time. Barbara Hepworth is another artist who, in my opinion, uses abstraction in a beautiful way. Her sculptures have a great fluidity despite the heavy materials used. Despite the very polished results that I admire, I don't want to make my sculptures that smooth and polished because there is such beauty in the stone's own texture and in most of my works I decide to make the human labor visible.
The stone sculptures of William Edmondson have a great influence on my practice as it showed me that you don't need to be a skilful artist to create powerful pieces. He himself didn't have any artistic background and only started carving stones when a pile of limestones were dismissed on his property.
This abstract sculptural stimulus made me think about how more contemporary they might be if they existed within a 3D space. To test this out I decided to learn on my own how to make 3D models on Blender. I intend to dive into animation so that the fluidity of my sculptures can be visual as well. I would like to create a VR experience when Cycladic-like figures of different colours wobble around in space. I believe that in this way I will connect something so prehistoric and classical in a whole new context and sensory experience. This project is also a personal way of connecting back to my roots and exploring how objects of the famous glorious past can be relevant in the today.
Throughout the past few months I keep coming back to how I can revisit all these cultural influences from Greece and translate them into something completely new and fresh. There is so much baggage attached to archaic greek art that new attempts seem to be overlooked in Greece. This largely roots back to the western iconic world that was fed to the people. It feels as though Greece is always two to three years behind the rest of Europe so, in a way, greek people are always chasing the popular norms of other countries. This of course undermines constantly any cultural growth because young people are sick of hearing about the glorious past and they try to imitate other contemporary movements, excluding of course, the greek element. As a person who, in the past, didn't really appreciate the culture, I feel that now, being away from home, I realise the importance of adding that element of home in my work.
Throughout the past few months I keep coming back to how I can revisit all these cultural influences from Greece and translate them into something completely new and fresh. There is so much baggage attached to archaic greek art that new attempts seem to be overlooked in Greece. This largely roots back to the western iconic world that was fed to the people. It feels as though Greece is always two to three years behind the rest of Europe so, in a way, greek people are always chasing the popular norms of other countries. This of course undermines constantly any cultural growth because young people are sick of hearing about the glorious past and they try to imitate other contemporary movements, excluding of course, the greek element. As a person who, in the past, didn't really appreciate the culture, I feel that now, being away from home, I realise the importance of adding that element of home in my work.
I was struck to find out that "the woman of Delos" (the latter sculpture) is so similar with the blue morph that I made, even though I wasn't familiar with Hans Arp's sculptures and practice. This added up to my thoughts on art repeating itself. Art seems to be so innate in every human that we unconsciously reproduce pieces that have already been made 20 years ago. What makes me nervous is if this keeps happening, does it mean that there is nothing new to be done? Does it mean that all the advances in art have been made and now we keep recycling the same things only in a different context? Of course context gives a new dimension to a piece but when we're talking about abstraction the context is usually vague so is it a reproduction or is it something new? How do we differentiate reproduction from authenticity?
As a part of my practice during the summer I did a diptych commission which was really an experiment to see how I could develop my personal style and still comply with the context that I was given. I decided to not do sketches before as I prefer to follow what the painting needs and wants. I used gold leafs which was a new material for me and I realised how much the painting changed with different lightings because when light hit the leafs the colour scheme changed completely.
details and installed view of the diptych
I've always liked the Pop Art movement but I was sceptical of some of the mot famous works of that period but after the essay I wrote about the interrelation of Pop with the post modern philosophy I became more interested in the works of the period, so I started reading a book that explained the different approaches in Pop in different periods and styles. After reading it I fully understood the reason why artists like Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein chose industrial mediums and the conceptual background behind the works. In my opinion Dada and Pop are very similar in the way the use ready mades and irony that sometimes led to works being viewed as political when they sometimes were not. One of the artists that I identified with in terms of material practice is Rosalyn Drexler who, even though used found materials she insisted on painting over them because she wanted the subjects to be "hidden but present, like a disturbing memory".
That particular phrase inspired me to make a series of collages where I will use old pictures of other people and mix them up together, muting them from their previous life and environment and creating a new dynamic and memory in the new context. In vintage shops in Athens one can find practically anything from furniture to photographs of unknown origins. A friend of mine bought some pictures and they all were so magical in their own way because they bared a very specific and unique emotion in them. The most interesting ones are the black and white ones from the time that everyone lived in a village with little to no money. The social structure of the greek villages always excited me because I grew up listening to all these little stories from my parents. Back then the photographs they took were mostly family, military or school photos and in all of them there was this austerity that I never saw in more recent photographs. Perhaps it was the hardships of that time but there was this austere and almost, savage, sense of beauty.Even the more recent photographs, of my parents for instance, are so much different from the ones that one could see from other countries because there still was that leftover angst of growing up in a village and heading to the city to make a living.
That particular phrase inspired me to make a series of collages where I will use old pictures of other people and mix them up together, muting them from their previous life and environment and creating a new dynamic and memory in the new context. In vintage shops in Athens one can find practically anything from furniture to photographs of unknown origins. A friend of mine bought some pictures and they all were so magical in their own way because they bared a very specific and unique emotion in them. The most interesting ones are the black and white ones from the time that everyone lived in a village with little to no money. The social structure of the greek villages always excited me because I grew up listening to all these little stories from my parents. Back then the photographs they took were mostly family, military or school photos and in all of them there was this austerity that I never saw in more recent photographs. Perhaps it was the hardships of that time but there was this austere and almost, savage, sense of beauty.Even the more recent photographs, of my parents for instance, are so much different from the ones that one could see from other countries because there still was that leftover angst of growing up in a village and heading to the city to make a living.
My parents' and grandparents' photographs.
As for the contextual background, I've been reading different books about post-modernism like Walter Benjamin's The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction and Jean Baudrillard's Relational Aesthetics, because the notion of authenticity and what is really authentic really fascinates me. Marcel Duchamp's urinal and Salvador Dali's Lobster Telephone, along with the idea behind Pop Art were what essentially moved my interest since they all deal with materiality in a very different way: Duchamp's was for me the first "punk" initiative in the art world because it dealt with the problem of what could be art, Dali's was about the surrealistic side of reality but with it still being very material and Pop Art was the more playful side of taking down copyrights. We can no longer determine what's really authentic due to how easy it is to reproduce things, whether that is artworks, texts or machinery. The element though that will always be new is our perception. This means that even if we see the same thing for years, each year it acquires different essence, not only because our mindset has changed but also because we know that it existed before so it kind of becomes a historical artifact even if it didn't contribute in anything in human history. Despite all this, I don't appreciate that much conceptual art pieces that constitute of a single item because I prefer to give to different points of view right away. For example Duchamp's urinal is not just a single urinal, it has an extra hint that is the inscription of the R. Mutt. I also don't agree that someone relies instantly on conceptual pieces because an artist must 'speak' the art language in other forms first to be able to say everything with nothing.
Influence: Hyon Gyon's solo exhibition at the Parasol Unit gallery was by far the best exhibition that I've seen in the past years. As soon as I stepped into the gallery I wanted to stay there forever. Most of the current exhibitions are all about conceptual or minimalistic works and we have forgotten the value of a well worked piece. The pieces were so strong and vibrant that the swallowed me inside them and I love the fact that its a whole different piece when viewed from afar. I also liked the three dimensional aspect of the paintings because she used industrial foam and burned it. Moreover, I was in awe with her sculptures which I think were a representation of the womanly nature and how the little girl's innocence transforms to something kind of scary since she used mostly teddy bears and stockings. They all had a very pop art aesthetic, from hidden Pringles cans to hello kitty details on the paintings. She incorporated perfectly all these elements which made her work very light and contemporary. The upstairs room was a very in-your-face attack of negative feelings. In there you could feel the anger and frustration of the artist. I loved the fact that she used simple imagery to portray that anger and that was intensified by the engraved nature of them.
As far as my painting practice goes, I saw the works of Tracey Emin at the White Cube Gallery and I was impressed by the intimacy and tension some of them had. What I didn't like was the insomnia room because I believe that it didn't blend in with all the other pieces in the exhibition. All of the other works were about motherhood and abuse and they all made sense and fused into one thinkership after seeing the video. Personally, after watching the video I tried to go back to the insomnia room to try to understand but I couldn't. It was just a separate piece that for me kicked the viewer out of the general aura that the other pieces created.
What I loved though was the monumental sculptures that were so stiff but so liquid too. All of them evoked a profound feeling of pain and despair but they all had a certain childlike touch to them because the bronze was worked so crudely that it reminds me the way children make sculptures. I tried to explore that idea of liquified form in my previous project but scale is what made her Emin's sculptures so intimidating. Influence:The installation of Grace Wales Bonner, Transformation at the Serpentine gallery impressed me because as soon as I stepped into the room I immediately got into that meditative mood. I think that the ohm sounds that where echoing in the mood was what really set the mood and made the audience engage. If I don't make a video to support my sound piece I would like to make an installation like that. I thought of using an incense waterfall because the invoke two senses, smell and sight and for me, smell is one of the strongest senses because I always combine a smell with a situation or a person.
I tried to make some masks of my face and even through errors and failures I decided to maybe use the experiments I did as a sculpture. My inspiration for this sculptural piece is Sarah Sitkin who uses different life casts to make interesting compositions. I like her work because it includes the dematerialisation of pieces that could stand alone and I believe that the destruction of a good piece is more valuable than the production of a good piece.
A DIVE INTO THE PSYCHE
The contextual background of the sculpture will be the alienation that I feel in the world of social media. Every day I feel like I have to change a facade to adapt to different situations: be the model daughter, be the confident girl that I portray on Instagram, be a productive and active artist/student. I feel like we all have to deconstruct and reconstruct our very basic self which in its core it's the same as everyone. That's why I chose to first put the foam doll head, which plays a double role: either that it is the simplest, purest basis or that it's just an empty, shallow shell. I believe that the postmodern culture wants to make everyone just a foam doll head, no opinions and initiatives of its own. The second phase will be the plastic mask of my face which symbolises the true deconstructed self, which is fragile and almost transparent. The last phase will be the mould of my face which is essentially the tool of adaptations and changes. The phases will be connected together by electrical wires which symbolise both the nervous system and the matrix of our culture. Post modernism's basis is simulacra and simulation which, for me today, is the dichotomy of oneself and the machine made self. Faces similar to each other appear on the screen and algorithms are designed to present similar things to us to which we feel like we relate but in the end it might not be exactly the thing we expected. As Jean Baudrillard said, "we have lost all ability to make sense of the distinction between nature and artifice". We can no longer distinct the person from the persona that they portray in social media. Everyone can create a persona that they would want to be. I believe this creates this dichotomy which leads to existential crises, since we are all manipulated and pushed to follow someone else's achievements in life because we feel like we should be having the same amount of success but that is ultimately virtual because we only share the good parts of our life. Personally, I am always unconsciously influenced by these things which in away I feel that I'm losing my own identity and that's what inspired me to make this sculpture. However, two design studios generated a program to playfully use this simulacra space that we call instagram. They initiated "a different application of AI in the realm of beauty. Comprised of computer scientists, art directors, coders and designers, the group are a global constellation of engineers and creatives who have created Beauty_GAN, a type of artificial intelligence algorithm that uses machine learning to produce imagery." "It is taught to spit out imagery. This imagery is fed into the discriminator network, which decides if the image is or isn’t a beauty image. This feedback is calculated by the generator and it produces more and more images until, after millions of tries, it manages to produce an image that fools the discriminator into thinking it’s an authentic beauty image, like those from the original data input. The computer is now able to create beauty looks without the help of a human." I was excited when I saw the images generated because they all have such a painterly and fluid aspect that they are solid art pieces. They all have a very cubist and surrealistic feel to them which reminds me of Francis Bacon's works. Influence: Magnus Sebastian is a not so famous post human sculptor who has done some nice sculptures. They have a steampunk vibe but personally I believe that some elements are off-putting. For example, the peacock feather in the first image doesn't serve any conceptual purposes. However, the hair made out of wires in the other half of the sculpture is more consistent with the concept. They both portray the mechanisation of the human nature that comes with more and more technological advances.
Inspiration: The disembodied nature of the sculpture resonates circus performances where human limits are questioned and odd body disfigurements are presented. Even though I don't agree with the way these people were portrayed, I think that they all have a kind of similar dichotomy in regard to who they really are and the facade they put on to please the crowd of the circus who went there to see "oddities".
Influence: I still remember the shock I felt when I first read about the infamous murderer Ed Gein who not only killed and exhumed dead women, he went on disembodying them and making house utilities like bowls from human skulls, real flesh gloves and he even made a whole woman bodysuit and mask out of different parts of women. So in a way he deconstructed and reconstructed the human body in order to please his own disturbed wish. He used to wear the bodysuit so that he could become his mother.
After seeing Heidi Bucher's sculptures I realised the connection of them with Ed Gein's bodysuits because hers give off that human touch and they appear almost alive and moving. I want to try and make some sculptures that appear to be frozen in time and that resonate a kind of innocence and nostalgia. I was always very driven by old, victorian children objects because they seem haunted and full of mysteries that make you feel almost uncomfortable.
Sound Piece Idea: I envision my sound piece to be a compilation of diamonds breaking, water drops and some eerie/ ambient sounds. I think I'll make it a soundtrack of a short film which will be possibly shot with a vhs camera or make a small installation. It will be around the idea of meditation and getting in touch with the higher self. I would like to make a mask mould of my own face but sculpting it with more idealised features or I could use the Ancient Greek tragic theatre masks which have an already exaggerated expression as a contrast to the state of the body which is calm during meditation.
I researched the properties of diamonds as healing crystals and I found that they stimulate and open all the chakras, especially the crown which is the 6th one and it's related to the "third eye". The crown chakra is also associated with the indigo colour which evokes intuition, extrasensory perceptions and inner wisdom. I want to either try to portray the indigo colour through the sound piece or maybe incorporate it in the installation so that it is a multi sensory experience. I'll be using sounds that are 852 Hz because that's one of the crown chakra frequencies. I do not intend to make a cohesive, very harmonic sound piece but a sort of sound collage which is mostly found material and it sets a mood. Sound piece inspiration: One of my favourite experimental albums is Plantasia by Mort Garson, which is supposed to help plants grow but the songs themselves are both beautiful and bizarre. There isn't much information about the album but someone mentioned that it was given for free along with a mattress in the 70's. I like the lo-fi vibes that the album has and if I was to do an experimental sound piece I would like to take that route.
Two other sound artists that inspired me are Hildegard Westerkamp and Brian Eno who both create very ambient and relaxing sounds. In particular, Hildegard's Kits Beach Soundtrack reminded me of some sleeping aid soundtracks that combine spoken word and earthly sounds which essentially make you visualise and sink into a very calming mood. Brian's sound pieces seem to fit very much in the urban life because they seem to fill the awkward or busy sounds of the city when nothing happens. For instance, Music for Airports seems to match that feeling of waiting that can be both a good and a bad emotion since for some this is a happy memory of going somewhere else and for some it bears emotions of sadness and not wanting to leave their home. So in a sense, it is very nostalgic but soothing and it has that lingering feel that something is changing, for the better or the worse.
As a big fan of David Lynch's movies, I was very intrigued by the soundtracks he chose because they had a very mysterious and lingering feel to them and combined with the avant-garde footage, they created this unique vibe. I found that most of the tracks were composed by Angelo Badalamenti and I like most his work in the movie Lost Highway. His tracks are melodic and dramatic but they don't impose themselves on the viewer, it's like they are only there to set the mood which is my ultimate goal for my sound piece. One of my favourite tracks is the Laura Palmer's theme and I found out that the way was created was by David Lynch just describing the scenery and Angelo Badalamenti captured that exact feeling. If you listen to it you can almost feel the character out alone in the woods and it leaves you with this lingering agony about what's going to happen next. That is my second goal for my piece, to make the audience visualise as they listen to it and so it will become a multi-sensory experience that leaves it with a feeling after.
Another artist who helped me understand more about sound art is Pauline Olivieros. Her pieces give off that same agony that Angelo Badalamenti achieved, not leaving the audience on the edge. I learned through her the term "deep listening" and I understood that this is exactly the goal of meditation too because by concentrating and expanding on the sounds, the mind doesn't receive them as signals, it creates a whole new understanding that leaves space for visualisation and almost out of body experiences.
Sound piece influence: Two years ago I came across an emerging female artist, Maria Forque who does live installations of herself and she has done some dj installations. She is always almost naked as her concept is the aesthetic, "It’s information for your eyes. The eye wants to be pleasured. I like to provoke eye-orgasms". I noticed that in her exhibition "mueble sexual" she was covered in gemstones and she was staying completely still. She works a lot on meditation and the shifts and changes in consciousness and that's the reason why she stays still.
Diamonds are used for spiritual healing, as they clear up the atmosphere and the help you rebalance and clear your mind and body. They can attract negative energies though because they absorb thoughts and radiate them outwards. So maybe diamonds aren't a girl's best friend after all. I want to play with that idea of intimacy that a girl has in her everyday life (for example, when self care takes place, it is some kind of unique ritual and it's different for each girl) combined with the myth of "diamonds are a girl's best friend". Who is really our best friend? Can it really be a materialistic object? After seeing a small part of Christian Marclay's "The Clock" and reading his view of the work I found that there is a similarity in my "Angel Hours' project and his. His film is a like a live narrative of bits and pieces of the everyday man that is bound by the concept of time. My piece is my personal interaction and engagement with time. I would look at my phone to see what time it is and come across some Angel Hours, which could be quite coincidental at times but it all comes down to how we perceive time and what time could mean. So, my work and Christian Marclay's touch the theme of time and how we react to it.
My inspiration for the small statues that I made is the first prehistoric sculptures. They served a magic role in man's life since most historians claim that the were possibly used for ritualistic activities. They had a minimalistic but also a kind of surrealistic appearance because their purpose was to portray the features needed. For example the Venus of Willendorf has body features that a pregnant woman should have because it was a charm for fertility. As angels are not portrayed in any form in modern religions, I decided to make my own version of angels based on the very simple and abstract appearance of those statues. I use simple everyday materials because I want to stick to that very basic purpose they would have. (photos)
I also found that a contemporary approach to the Stone Age era is lo-tech and maybe Mono-ha. Lo-tech is all about used very simple materials put tother to make a piece. Yasue Maetake is a great sculptor who "inspired by Baroque sculpture, where figures are depicted in motion, (she) seek(s) to create life-like forms reminiscent of dynamic structures composed of raw elements". I like the way she used melted glass and other materials to create different volumes and masses who really inhabit the exhibition space. She is exploring the relation between organic materials and industrial-like forms because of the way the contradict and at the same time balance out each other.
I like these sketches of Basquiat because the texts in them play an active role. It's like he's connecting thoughts and elements on the paper like connecting dots. I'll be using a similar way of noting in my project. (photo) An artist that I found really interesting who has done mostly text- based artworks is Lawrence Weiner. His work in the 1960s involved writing about possible projects without actually making them and he stated in "Declaration of Intent" (1968) :
1. The artist may construct the piece. 2. The piece may be fabricated. 3. The piece need not be built. Each being equal and consistent with the intent of the artist the decision as to condition rests within the receiver upon the occasion of receivership. I believe that this declaration upgrades the conceptual art domain because the artist himself becomes the project. When I started the Angel Hours project I thought about the fact that I might not find a way to see what the angels are trying to tell me and it might be a deeply spiritual thing that can't be materialised so it could become a conceptual art piece in which the finished piece is only in my head. The only way to witness the piece is me to talk about it. Project Idea, "Angel Hours": I keep seeing mirrored hours on the clock for the past two months and some say that it's the angels trying to send you a message and I researched a bit on these numbers but I think that the messages manifest themselves after some time. I want to play with the idea of incorporating these numbers and their meaning in my drawings. They can play a double role: the text itself with its literal meaning and forms of colour or texture. Or I could start looking for a connection between these numbers and actions in my daily life since the significance of them is given by someone else and it's more of a personal thing. I tried making some drawings where I incorporate the significance of them and some sort of personal dialogue but it would be more interesting to pile up daily thoughts and realisations and things that are connected to that particular angel number and then trying to figure out the bigger picture. In that way the documentation becomes the work and I always believed that the process of the work is as important as the final outcome.
After trying to see what is the immediate message on the day that I see an angel number, I realised that they manifest in the near future but I'm still trying to see the connection between these numbers and my thoughts and actions that day.
An interesting fact I found was that in Pagan religion "angels" don't have a particular name but they are "highly evolved beings, and are indeed messengers but not between mortals and God, but between mortals and the Universal Creators." Moreover, Pagans rely on the practice of numerology. The basis of numerology is that numbers have a spiritual, magical and planetary significance.
Many Pagan spiritual traditions incorporate the practice of numerology. The basic principles of numerology hold that numbers have a great deal of spiritual and magical significance. Some numbers are more potent and powerful than others, and combinations of numbers can be developed for magical use. In addition to magical correspondences, numbers also tie into planetary significance. Idea: AI is taking over our everyday life and soon cyborgs will be real. The introduction of AI alienates humans more and more and I'd like to play with that idea of half human- half cyborg as it represents a very real and futuristic idea. I believe that a cyborg positioned in very laic surroundings is the ultimate image of alienation and detachment that many people experience in today's society. I also like the contrast between something so futuristic, weird to look at and something pop-culture ( like a street market), because the "creature" in that space creates an unsettling feeling to the people. Stelarc Thought: I'd like to make a series of portraits of different personas and I maybe I would take the portraits in their individual environment.
|
Inspiration: How different techniques interact with each other. I really like the work of Lucas Samaras because he achieved a very painterly result by manipulating photography and drawing.