Born in 1967, a photographer, conceptual artist and film maker, Sam Taylor-Wood has led an interesting life to say the least. When she was nine, her family was abandoned by her biker father, and her mother decided to move them all to a commune in Sussex. She’s well known for her interest in John Lennon, having recently directed a film about his youth called ‘Nowhere boy’. In collaboration with Henry Bond, another photographer, she also recreated the famous photograph of Yoko and Lennon taken only hours before his untimely death:
The above photo, while an exact reflection of their positions in the original photo, seems to show a reversal in the male-female roles. You can see a dependency in Lennon's position for Yoko, almost reflecting the opinion of Albert Goldman that Lennon regarded Ono as an "almost magical being" who could solve all his problems, (however according to Goldman this was a "grand delusion", as Ono regularly cheated on Lennon with "gigolos").Sam Taylor-Wood, as well as dabbling in photography to great effect, has done some incredible film work, most notably among them filming a fruit set (revered as one of the art world's most used still life) as it began to decay.
At first I thought the pen was there to contrast with the fruit visually, so while the fruit decays the pen remains still, in the same place, showing how the scene is the work of time. But I think on further reflection it has a deeper meaning in terms of contrast. The pen represents the ability to write, to note down knowledge. It is an invention invented by humans to record, while the fruit is representative of life, and how it eventually decays. It could be interpreted as how even as we grow old and die, we retain our knowledge, and it is left behind for others, as evidence of our existence when we are truly gone.
Sam Taylor-Wood also did a very interesting video for her exhibition, where she filmed David Beckham asleep:
It's simple, it's just a man sleeping, barely moving, occasionally twitching, shifting position, but always essentially the same, and yet it's got a subtle impact. David Beckham is someone we've all heard of, someone we know quite well from the papers, we know about his football career, his marriage to Victoria Beckham, his family and this is looking at him from an entirely different angle. He looks almost innocent in sleep, like we could reach out and touch him, which might be what Taylor-Woods was going for. It's very similar to a project done by Andy Warhol in the 60's, when he filmed a man sleeping for six hours and called it "Sleep".
Andy Warhol
Born in 1982, Warhol was a leading figure in the Pop Art movement as a painter, printmaker and film maker. When he was young he suffered chorea, and as a result of his treatment developed a phobia of hospitals and doctors. This affected his relationships at school as he was often at home bedridden, and during this time he would listen to the radio, put up pictures of movie stars around his room and draw, a period of time Warhol felt contributed significantly to his later fame and fortune.
On the third of June he was shot by Valerie Solanas and barely escaped with his life, which had a profound effect on him and his art. Talking about his near death he said "Before I was shot, I always thought that I was more half-there than all-there – I always suspected that I was watching TV instead of living life. People sometimes say that the way things happen in movies is unreal, but actually it's the way things happen in life that's unreal. The movies make emotions look so strong and real, whereas when things really do happen to you, it's like watching television – you don't feel anything. Right when I was being shot and ever since, I knew that I was watching television. The channels switch, but it's all television."
It could very well be this mentality that gave life to his film work, one of which was a film of his close friend John Giorni asleep for five hours and twenty minutes. Warhol put something real, something we all relate to onto a screen which often hosts the fictional, the dramatic, the entertaining and emotional, and I think this is particularly linked back to his mentality on being shot and how it was like watching television. Looking at it from another angle however, it could simply be mocking television unrealness, it's need for the exciting and dramatic, and he went on to do other similar features, like his film 'Eat' which ran for 45 minutes and was of a man eatting a mushroom.
My experiments:
In response to the video work done by Sam Taylor-Woods and Andy Warhol, I have done a short film I call 'Brushing my Teeth' which plays for over five minutes. I also experimented on the footage using windows media player with different settings. For something so ordinary, I think it's strangely fascinating. Like with Taylor-Wood's sleeping David Beckham, and Warhol's 'sleep' and 'eat', I think there's something in it which is hard to explain. A simpleness with hidden complexities. Just looking back at my video, it's strange to think that what I do every night without even thinking about has such steps, such stages.
Brushing my teeth (original, without audio)
Brushing my teeth (film grain effect)
Brushing my teeth (different video effects)
The above video is mainly experimenting with the video effects available on windows media player, it's interesting to see how they change and contort the impact of the original footage.For instance the section with water colour I find particularly interesting, because it's nearly impossible to tell what's happening. The different effects give the video new personalities in a way.
I also did a stop motion video of the ritual of preparing for bed. Again I used windows movie maker, but I think if I were to do something like it again, I would use flash, as it was very long and painstaking process on window movie maker.
(Note, the audio used belongs to its respective owners and not me. I would also like to add this video was not created for commercial purposes, it is simply art for an art based photography exam)
I think the use of music in the background gives it a more upbeat flow, which in use with the stop motion creates a lively and interesting beat which I think gives more personality and life to the overall video. The low quality of the video is a bit of a disadvantage, but it would have taken three hours to save in high quality (due to the huge amount of high quality photographs taken) with no guarantee of actually working, so I turned the quality option down. However, I think it works well regardless.
screenshots of the process on windows movie maker:
No comments:
Post a Comment