This screening at PFA showed four video artworks: Theresa Hak Kyung Cha’s Mouth to Mouth, John Baldssari’s I am making art, Vito Acconci’s Theme Song, and Nancy Holt and Robert Smithson’s East Coast, West Coast. I thought Cha’s work was particularly interesting; her mouth appeared in a swamp of video noise as she uttered something into the video camera. At some point during the showing, the video noise looked similar to streams of water randomly flowing on the screen. The effect made by the video noise exerted a sense of virtual reality. The juxtaposition of the mouth, the video noise, and the sound made by the mouth made me feel as if there was a gigantic mouth and we were all immersed in a void filled with noise and about to be sucked into the mouth.
I thought Baldssari’s video was the most bizarre of the four shown. Baldessari repositioned his body in a seemingly endless array of postures while uttering “I am making art.” The repositioning and utterance went on for about twenty-five minutes, and by the time it was over, I felt a strong sense of relief. I thought it was a bit painful to sit through the entire clip as he seems to make a mockery of what is art. Nonetheless, his work reminded me of what Bergson said about duration and becoming. Contrary to photography and cinematography where duration is obviously not captured, Badessari’s pause in between gestures also seemed to imply that there was also discontinuity of duration in video.
Acconci and Holt’s works playing back to back presented an interesting comparison of “reality” experienced by viewers through video. Acconci attempts to seduce the viewers by saying “come to me, I know you want to be with me,” even though he and the viewers were fully aware that the act of crossing into the video camera is not possible. His direct gaze into the video camera also had a penetrating effect that enhanced a sense of reality. I thought the act of his holding a cigarette was a very clever one. It showed the passage of time, and this was exactly the time experienced by the viewers. An element of reality was reproduced to accentuate the desired effect through cigarettes.
Instead of directly talking into the video camera, Holt and Smithson’s casual (at times humorous) conversation engaged the viewers to be part of their conversation in an non-intimidating way. Holt and Smithson didn’t look directly at the camera, instead they looked across the table where they were sitting. Even though it was quite obvious that there was no one sitting on the other side, it had an interesting effect in making the viewers felt as if we were in their “reality”.
- Cathy Hwang
Saturday, March 10, 2007
Thursday, March 8, 2007
Cinema 1: The Movement-Image, Gilles Deleuze
1. In the first commentary Deleuze contradicts Bergson’s first thesis of movement being very different from space since “the space covered is divisible…whilst movement is indivisible.” (1) Bergson is saying that movements are “irreducible among themselves,” because they are all continuous and at the same time all different making it impossible to divide up into homogeneous equivalents. Furthermore, Bergson’s thesis suggested that since movement is heterogeneous it cannot be reconstructed with still “positions in space or instants in time: that is, with immobile sections.” (1) This is a clear reference to cinematography which attempts to reconstitute movement on the screen by quickly combining static frames together. Deleuze asks a very interesting question, however, which causes us to think in a different perspective about reality: “Can we conclude that the result is artificial because the means are artificial?”(2) First, this made me think of cinemas and their apparatus—even though the movement is machine made, does that make it fake? Is movement only real in real time…when it is blatantly in front of us? Isn’t it still movement if someone is moving around “on the screen” even though it was shot from still frames? Moreover, this made me think of video art and the idea of reality vs. virtual reality. If a movie or a game opens up our senses and makes us feel a part of it even though we aren’t actually in them—what is reality? Is it only what is physically around us at any given moment, or can it also constitute anything that makes us feel like we are a part of it?
2. In his discussion of Bergson’s second thesis, Deleuze defines cinema as “the system which reproduces movement by relating it to the any-instant-whatever.” (6) This any-instant-whatever is basically any instant that is equidistant from another one—like the numbers on a clock. What caught my attention was that Deleuze describes cinema as “‘industrial art’…neither an art nor a science,” because this makes us question the purpose of cinema. Deleuze argues that it doesn’t have much scientific interest since science focuses on analysis and it is hard to analyze something related to “any-instant-whatever” which is literarily any random moment in time. Furthermore, he argues that cinema does not have much artistic credibility because art focuses more on “poses and forms that science had rejected.” (6) What is “industrial art” then? Industrial implies machine-made, modern, and repetitive. Art holds connotations of uniqueness, creativity, individuality, and man-made. Thus, it is difficult to image what these two words combined would create. Nevertheless, suggesting that cinema is exactly that is very interesting—I never thought of it that way before. It is simultaneously man-made because it uses machines, but, it produces movement which is something natural, and human-like.
3. The section on Bergson’s third thesis describes his philosophy is a general formula. Basically, reality consists of “movement as mobile section” and “qualitative change” (9) while the illusion in which we all live consists of “immobile sections” and “movement” (9). So, in reality everything is constantly changing including movement; also, instead of objects changing because they are moving, it is their qualities that constantly vibrate and change. The illusion that our perception builds, however, is that the world is made up of static objects and the change only arises from their movement which is direct and has a distinct beginning and end.
4. Lastly, in the section identifying the image and the movement, Deleuze makes a (what seems as a) profound but very confusing statement which caught my attention: “with the cinema, it is the world which becomes its own image, and not an image which becomes world.” (57) Does he mean that cinema is becoming greater than the world in a sense since it can do so much that we cannot do in reality? I understood this as if the world becomes its own image then the camera is the mirror into which the world looks to see its own reflection.
Alina Goldenberg
2. In his discussion of Bergson’s second thesis, Deleuze defines cinema as “the system which reproduces movement by relating it to the any-instant-whatever.” (6) This any-instant-whatever is basically any instant that is equidistant from another one—like the numbers on a clock. What caught my attention was that Deleuze describes cinema as “‘industrial art’…neither an art nor a science,” because this makes us question the purpose of cinema. Deleuze argues that it doesn’t have much scientific interest since science focuses on analysis and it is hard to analyze something related to “any-instant-whatever” which is literarily any random moment in time. Furthermore, he argues that cinema does not have much artistic credibility because art focuses more on “poses and forms that science had rejected.” (6) What is “industrial art” then? Industrial implies machine-made, modern, and repetitive. Art holds connotations of uniqueness, creativity, individuality, and man-made. Thus, it is difficult to image what these two words combined would create. Nevertheless, suggesting that cinema is exactly that is very interesting—I never thought of it that way before. It is simultaneously man-made because it uses machines, but, it produces movement which is something natural, and human-like.
3. The section on Bergson’s third thesis describes his philosophy is a general formula. Basically, reality consists of “movement as mobile section” and “qualitative change” (9) while the illusion in which we all live consists of “immobile sections” and “movement” (9). So, in reality everything is constantly changing including movement; also, instead of objects changing because they are moving, it is their qualities that constantly vibrate and change. The illusion that our perception builds, however, is that the world is made up of static objects and the change only arises from their movement which is direct and has a distinct beginning and end.
4. Lastly, in the section identifying the image and the movement, Deleuze makes a (what seems as a) profound but very confusing statement which caught my attention: “with the cinema, it is the world which becomes its own image, and not an image which becomes world.” (57) Does he mean that cinema is becoming greater than the world in a sense since it can do so much that we cannot do in reality? I understood this as if the world becomes its own image then the camera is the mirror into which the world looks to see its own reflection.
Alina Goldenberg
Sunday, March 4, 2007
Pine Flat
This film by Sharon Lockhart was composed in two hour long halves. The first consisted of six 10 minute segments, with a single fixed frame shot of individual children interacting with their setting. The first shot captures a mountain during one of the winter snow falls and a young girl yelling in the background in search of her friend. Even from the first scene the film played with the viewers expectation of what "should happen". Current methods of film making have conditioned their viewers to expect some large climactic event that builds the overall plot. However aside from the natural setting and slow pace of the actions, continuity within the individual scenes is non-existent. Each shot tends to grow more frustrating then the next because the need for action is never fulfilled. From a girl reading a book on a grassy hillside, to the boy sitting along side a stream with his harmonica, or even the boy sleeping on the grass, these seem to represent nature rather than man's effects on it. Only every once in a while does man's influence corrupt the natural sounds with the sound of a gun shot, or an airplane flying over head, or a bus coming to pick up a roadside student. The movie seemed more like a "Soothing Sounds of Nature" Tape that people play right before bed. The action takes a back seat to the sounds that permeate throughout the shot. The subtle snow falling, the babbling of the brook, or the wind gusting through the tall grass; each replaces the real actors (the children) within the shot due to the viewer's search for some movement or plot.
The second half also consists of six 10 minute fit framed shots, but instead have the interaction of multiple children from the small Central Californian town. Again the first shot displays a forest covered in snow, however differing from the opening scene, children emerge at the bottom of the shot and move toward the top and finally disappear as the final minute of the shot runs out. It occurs to the viewer that the film is not necessarily about its subjects, but instead about the portrayal of time and the viewer’s reaction to Lockhart's play with time. Because there is such little action occurring within each shot (or at least not the type of action we are used to with Jean Claude kicking in doors and Spiderman swinging between buildings) it seems that the film has captured both duration and the pregnant moment at the same time. Aside from making its viewers feel like stalkers (when watching the two couples making out, etc.) the film also confronts man's obsession to cut out the "uneventful time" within film. Film has become like Sports Center Highlights given neither enough time to take in the setting or the whole plot.
- Olivia Hatalsky
The second half also consists of six 10 minute fit framed shots, but instead have the interaction of multiple children from the small Central Californian town. Again the first shot displays a forest covered in snow, however differing from the opening scene, children emerge at the bottom of the shot and move toward the top and finally disappear as the final minute of the shot runs out. It occurs to the viewer that the film is not necessarily about its subjects, but instead about the portrayal of time and the viewer’s reaction to Lockhart's play with time. Because there is such little action occurring within each shot (or at least not the type of action we are used to with Jean Claude kicking in doors and Spiderman swinging between buildings) it seems that the film has captured both duration and the pregnant moment at the same time. Aside from making its viewers feel like stalkers (when watching the two couples making out, etc.) the film also confronts man's obsession to cut out the "uneventful time" within film. Film has become like Sports Center Highlights given neither enough time to take in the setting or the whole plot.
- Olivia Hatalsky
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