Sound of Silence - Final Piece

JOHN BALDESSARI

Today I went to the Baldessari exhibition at the Tate and was very impressed by his work, taking simplistic (which does not have to mean basic) idea's and turning them into a visual interpretation which could be understood and interpreted in our own specific ways. I feel he questioned visual language and pushed his own ideals into his work. 

Favorite quotes:

"A friend of mine who taught painting had all his students stand on one foot only while painting. If the student was physically off balance a new sense of order would emerge in their work."

"Our obsession with capturing a likeness"

Baldessari used to go around "trying to look between things instead of at things."

It was refreshing and inspirational to see his work as he seemed to have an intimate understanding of projecting his idea's and thought process, presenting what we do not see every day and creating an order through it. Such as "Four portraits of swords aligned." - reconstructing images.

One way to sum up his work could be "THE POWER OF SUGGESTION" which is what I like most about his work. With the image above the Baldessari quotes; "How do we render images to be powerless?"

Therefore he covers the faces or any particular part of the image that supplies information with a very simple color or circle, and therefore we are left to take in or explore the rest of the image. 

However this is only one area of his work which supplies a concept and solution. 

Found this quote in a short video on you tube:

John Baldessari:

“I am very interested in way people look at things, or don’t look at things. We automatically look at somebody face first, if you take that away then they have to look someplace else. Delete one thing after another until there’s only white left and you’ll still be looking at the white. You just want to look at something. You can sort of condition how people look”

 

Sound of Silence "THE PITCH"

Title: Irresolute (means to doubt something or be hesitant towards the unknown.)

Without sound we find replacements or try to improvise with what we know. However what about sounds that we are unaware of or cannot connect to, with the image or scene being presented. 

Within our film we wish to create a sense of isolation due to the lack of an understanding of the sound produced by the event that is happening on the screen. Working on an aesthetic which completely indulges the viewer (a feast for the eyes) which isolates them from the sound even further. Our task, to subconsciously isolate the viewer from the result of not understanding the sound.

Narrative: pure visual language that the viewer may not understand.

Sound of Silence

Without sound we find replacements or try to improvise with what we know. However what about sounds that we are unaware of or cannot connect to. 

Seeing a moving clip of a man walking down a street without any sound, we can interpret the sound of his footsteps and gain an understanding of the clip. However if we are presented with a silent clip where we are unaware of what sound is being produced we are suddenly stuck and isolated without an understanding of what is going on, left in the unknown and unable to interoperate in a comfortable way.

    

Everything is Connected

"Mexican Death"

With this new project I've decided to go down the path of looking into the connection of life and death, and the possible ways we try and connect these two spectrums together. The "Day of the Dead," which is a day celebrated in Mexico, where the holiday focuses on the gatherings of family and friends to pray for and remember friends and family members who have died. 

Skeleton masks and skulls are mostly used to represent this holiday. What interested me was the possibilities of the mask itself, where once worn does this connect the person more to the dead? Maybe subconsciously however masks worn at festivals we use to connect to the celebration or moment. But I do feel a mask creates an almost schizophrenic impact as your identity and personality is lost almost instantly as the mask is put on. A mask of a skull, our behavior would differentiate from a mask of a horse. 

But my main task of this project so far is to present the ways in which we, the living try to connect with the dead, (influenced through the Mexican "Day of the Dead.") 

Compositions and Pose

Today I bought a small book on the Renaissance, of the classical paintings from that era. From studying History of Art I had completely forgotten about these historical paintings and their hidden values. 

Today it feels sometimes as though we are looking for a new and original way to present our work, however I keep forgetting that you can only truly move forward with an understanding of the past. Some my not agree with this but once learnt the essentials of what works/worked then you can develop and move forward. 

The one thing I love about these paintings is the gracefulness captured in the figures by the poses they hold, and therefore they can be presented forever in a calm and effortless manner. Therefore it would be interesting to take these poses and re-design the story, taking what works and creating it into your own. I'm not saying simply copy but use to your advantage. 

Sound into Vision

With the sound of a washing machine, I saw the sound as three layers, and knowing where the sound was being produced from this cycling movement, I decided not to work against it but use to my advantage of the circular motion and project this in my final piece. The whole page filled to represent a confined space of where sound is produced where it is chaotic but also confined at the same time. Using the "@" sign being repeated it does loose it's meaning and therefore can be used to represent something else. For this instance sound. 

I mainly just wanted to look at progression of the noises created and therefore use gradients allowing movement and the thin vibrations caused by the washing machine. 

John Maede has influenced me in the past for his ideals of simplicity and here I just wanted to keep it simple and not overcomplicate the presentation of the sound. Take inspiration from the mark making but then simplify and develop, I tried not to just imitate.

Sound into Vision - The Importance of Mark Making?

By transferring sound into a visual status it can be seen as to just scribble away and be worried that the drawing has not been a success apart from a few childish lines, however I've been reminded by this project that mark making is an important step that should always be taken by playing with shapes, compositions, materials and textures. Applying thought and emotion into your work by just experimenting and seeing what happens at the beginning by just drawing. At the beginning of every project or when stuck at a certain point in a project drawing 50 quick drawings can create or save a project. Maybe only one of the 50 drawing that you made works but at least you no know what doesn't work and you can develop. 

TRIAL and ERROR is what makes a project work. I forgot this process and now it's time to reintroduce it and use it to my full advantage.

 

 

For The Love of Film

When a film is made i wonder if the director or creator of the story tries to understand how many times the film will be seen by one individual. Some films i've seen i watch once and never see again. However other films I repeatedly watch and every time a new scene is presented new aspects of the film are caught. I love taking stills of films for the simple reason that it shows how well everything is composed but also you never see a film usually paused unless needed to. But it's the idea of then seeing the image as a picture rather than a stopped film.

VIDEO POWER

With the thousands of still images that are blended together to create a film, I wanted to show this pulsating flow moving through film as if giving life to the images. An image that is static suddenly becomes moving and you are instantly involved and a part of the scene.