While at the Met Breuer, I screened many films and viewed many pieces by Brazilian artist Lygia Pape. The film that caught my attention the most was one titled Divisor (Divider). The piece featured a large group of people wearing one large white sheet with holes in it for their heads while they walked down a large street. The film itself was a recreation of Pape’s performance art piece of the same title that was a statement against the dictatorship in Brazil at the time. What interested me about the film was how the sheet created a large mass out of the individuals that wore it. It forced them to walk and march in a very uniform manner, which was highlighted by the blaring white of the “divider” itself.

The film also featured many close-ups of the people wearing the sheet. The camera would often pick one person out of the group and then follow them as they walked down the street. This allowed the viewer to closely gauge and watch the reactions of those participating in the film. At times, the participants would even pull out a camera to take a picture or film the spectacle around them. This made think of our culture today and our desire to capture video and pictures constantly. The film focused on some of these individuals as they looked through their cameras, walking along with everybody around them.

At various points in the film, the participants would duck out of the head hole of the sheet and disappear underneath. It was impossible to see them under the huge white fabric. Because the “divider” made the people walk and look like a uniform military or police, I wondered if the Pape was trying to suggest death at these points in the film. The other participants continued to march in the same order and fashion that they did before, but as the film continued more and more places where there were once people was now just a white blank space.

Even though I could not pinpoint exactly what Pape might have been trying to suggest in this piece, watching the massive shape of people and movement was quite mesmerizing  and beautiful. I noticed that much of her  work, including some of her other films, dealt much with geometric shapes moving in a space. The final image of the piece was the “divider” now void of people and just moving as it were a flag in the wind.

Yesterday, I got tickets to a small cineplex theater called the Metrograph in the Bowery, and they was screening a documentry from Istanbul. Istanbul is one of the oldest cites in Turkey where cats is seen to be sacred animals. The documentry is interveiw based and is told in Turkish but from the cats perspective so most of the camera angles are low to the ground. It’s a national custom to treat the cats with love and respect so the people in the street make room for them when they walk through the crowds. These cats are strays but they do not behave in a way you’d expect a stray animal would behave in America. The first cat we meet Sari is a golden cat who meows for food but we see whenever she gets a large piece of food we follow her to an apartment basement. In this apartment ground floor lobby is a group of kittens where we learned to be her children. I already mentioned that the documentry was an interview based film. They interviewed the humans who interact with the cats on daily basis. A shopkeeper who looks after Sari says her pesonailty changed after she had her children she used to be very carefree but now she is very serious and focused. Then we meet Bengu who unlike Sari who searches for food Bengu serches for affection. So we would see Bengu getting groomed from a stranger, or he would meet up with a friend who owns a boat and he take a boat ride with him. Then we meet an aggressor who pick fights with other cats, and cats being already territorial animals Psikopat is always in confrontation with other cats. So the documentary introduces them as Sari the Hustler, Bengu the lover, and Psikopat the psycho. All nicknames that reflect their different personalities. the film follow seven cats that live day by day and the way they interact with humans is interesting. It almost like they’re very self aware and independent. It’s a very interesting documentry and you should get tickets to the Metrograph and check it out.

Lygia Pape: A Multitude of Forms is the first monographic exhibition in the United States. A Multitude of Forms is an exhibition at The Met Breuer. She combined geometric abstraction with space and body in a unique way. When you enter the exhibition room, you will see lots of sculptures, prints, photography, and short films. There were lots of interesting works in her exhibition. However, there was one short film that caught my eyes. The film called “O OVE” which means “The Egg”. This film was performed at Barra da Tijuca beach in 1967. The film was a single-channel digital video, super 8 film, color and 1 minute 20 sec. “O OVE” designated actors activate symbolic geometric props to create the drama of this work. The film shows three large cube-shaped “egg” and three actors. Each actor was in the large cube-shaped “egg” and then they rip off the box. They came out from the box and played small instrument with a big smile. The final scene showed Pape sitting on the beach in front of the large cube-shaped boxes and three actors were standing on the back of the large cube-shaped boxes. Finally, the image freeze. Pape “represented a generation’s utopian desire to create a new society” through the large cube-shaped “egg”. Through the large cube-shaped “egg”, Pape wanted to show the symbolism of rebirth.

I really liked the video because I could understand what Pape wanted to say through this video clearly. When the three actors rip the box and came out from the large cube-shaped “egg”, audiences could see their feelings because they were smiling and then playing small instrument and dancing. This showed that not only their situation but also their emotion. Even though the video was very short, the video included the main idea clearly. However, I wanted to see more images about Pape. Pape just appeared at the ending scene like 5 seconds just sitting so I wanted to see her more. Overall it was really interesting piece.

The Maribor Uprisings is an interactive documentary about the protests in Maribor, Slovenia. The film was presented at Union Docs by directors Maple J. Razsa and Milton Guillen as a live participatory event wherein the whole audience participates with each other in the decision-making process of the interactive documentary.

The story itself is very simple. It’s a story of corruption in government ranging from exclusionary legislation to embezzlement countered by the people of Maribor demanding accountability. Their demands and their anger evolved into organized and guerilla protests against the Slovenian political elite. The protests spanned the sum of four months and amounted to 80 hours of footage for the directors to navigate. They explained their choice for an interactive documentary as the footage itself demanding a voyeuristic experience. They wanted to create an experience which echoed global uprisings and our insurgent generation.

Before the film began, the directors explained the decision-making process. Throughout the story we were given checkpoints with two choices on how the story would unfold. We had to democratically and collectively decide which choice to make. The legitimacy of the democratic process can be argued since the directors still had the primary power over the process and made the executive decisions over the progression of choices. This point, however, supports the primary thesis of the film: the interactions between the audience and the directors, the roles each audience member inferentially plays, and the debates between audience members reflect the same social dynamics which take place during actual protests. One definitive choice the directors made to counter the reality of an apparent power hierarchy within protests was to give priority to femmes and people of color during discussions. The directors also explained if people feel they can easily speak up in crowds, they should give room to people who find it difficult to speak. Concurrently, people who find it difficult to speak in large crowds should challenge themselves and make choices for the audience. Once the rules were set, the directors prefaced the start of the film and said there is “no way back from the chaos.” Then the film began.

Continue reading “The Maribor Uprisings: a Live Participatory Event by Maple J. Razsa and Milton Guillen” →

This week, I visited BRIC Art / Media House and the Public Access / Open Networks Exhibition it was holding. BRIC isn’t necessarily known to a lot of students because of its small title, but the exhibition was beyond amazing. It was very much “experimental” and I wished the whole class could have been there to see and experience the displays they had to offer. Plus, it was free. (This exhibition is still going on through May 7). The exhibition was on Public Access / Open Networks. I’m not going to lie. Initially, I was so confused to what this exhibition was all about. All I knew was that it had to do with more contemporary art.

On thing I realized was that because the BRIC Art / Media House was such a small area for multiple events, it really emphasized one or two exhibitions at a time. The main one being, Public Access / Open Networks. They utilized the whole space including the walls. Let me tell you, it was definitely aesthetically pleasing and beautifully set. Also, I went at a time when it was empty so I literally went all over the place several times.

The exhibition was all about the history of Public Access Television (1970s) as well as using technology in media to raise movements and encourage activists to have a voice. Because in the 1970s, cable started to open opportunities for this “alternate television” of free speech and free form art. Many artists rose in this era and they are recognized and remembered today for their sense of bravery to pull through with such new and unique styles of expression through art. Just like the quote in the exhibition display, “we look on cable as a way of encouraging public action, not just access”. This change in technology and media opened doors to take action and make a move, not just know that there is access and not do anything. Another quote that hit me was, “[the artist] must seek the truth and make it visible regardless of the consequences”. These people were desperate to create content that will get the world stirring and hungry for freedom. Freedom to be whoever they want to be. Queer, gay, happy, sad, expressive, angry, etc.. These artists desired to be open and out there. 

There were many things that fascinated me. One was the display on Ann Hirsch. She is a video artist who “deconstructs female sexuality and the male gaze to explore how technology and social media shape perceptions of gender and identity”. She used YouTube and created this character where she would try to portray herself as a who who is both sexual and human. This was provoking and interesting because many the Internet rarely mentioned this combination of whether woman can be both sexual and human. It definitely had a feminist undertone, which is very much more expressive and accepted today.

One interesting one was Static.  It really didn’t have much description except that it loops every two minutes, but I liked this display. It was literally a static screen, but I could watch it for a long time without being bored because even though it can be “just static”, it also seemed so expressive, chaotic, and noisy. Almost as if it was trying to tell me something.

Lastly, I enjoyed a video display of Nam June Paik’s Good Morning Mr. Orwell (1984). I loved the crazy editing as well as the use of colors. No to mention, the way the sound flowed beautifully with the visuals was beautiful. Paik’s videos “explore the intersection of the art world, pop culture, media, philosophy, and technology. Good Morning Mr. Orwell (1984) was in particularly so amazing because it showcased “his vision for this globalized new media in a live international satellite installation”. He desired international potential in television, which is very common and well used today. (Sadly, I forgot to take a picture of this.)

One last quote is: “Public Access is the mother of all social media, the original uncurated social art”. While I was watching these different type of videos, hearing so many voices, and reading so many hopes and dreams, I realized that Public Access really began this journey of expression through Media. It’s because of those artists who initiated and started their artwork… that we are here today, strong and bold, bonded and united, when social issues and movements are created for the better of today.

*If ya’ll are interested in the history of Public Access and the experimental pieces artists used to express their voices, GO TO THE EXHIBITION!!!

Lucas Chang

Experimental Video Production

This Sporting Life
I went to go see the the film “This Sporting Life” at the Film Forum on Thursday night. There was a solid amount of people in attendance to watch the film which was around at least 30-40. The film “This Sporting Life” is about the life of a man named Frank Machin. Machin was an unsuccessful coal miner who then became a star rugby player for one of the city’s best rugby league teams in all of Wakefield. The club owner named Gerald Weaver recruits and signs Machin after seeing him play in a trial game and liked his angry and aggressive style of play.

I found this film very interesting because in my opinion, I felt like it had addressed some issues that can be related to real life. For example, when we think of the results of aggressive behavior and actions, we often think of negative repercussions and responses. Whether people have to pay a certain fine, or are arrested, we often pair aggression with negativity. However in the film “This Sporting Life” we get to see examples of how aggressive and anger can lead to both positive and negative results.

One of the examples of aggression being a positive thing is when Machin is when he defends himself at the night club while beating up some of the locals at the club after he was threatened by one of the captains of the rugby team, which ultimately got him a trial game for the rugby league team. One other example, is throughout the rugby game when Machin punches and elbows his own teammate for not passing the ball and the referees mistake the opposing player for the violation instead of Machin. However, Gerald Weaver, the manager of the rugby team likes the aggressive style of play displayed by Machin and views him as an asset to the league team as a way of making a profit. As a result, Weaver and the rest of management signs Machin to a contract to play rugby for the city league team. In this analysis we see that because of Machin’s brutality, he is rewarded with a new job with great pay as well.

One example of the negative aspect of Machin’s aggression is when he eventually starts to have romantic feelings towards a widow named Margaret. Unfortunately for Machin, Margaret cannot reciprocate his feelings because she is still grieving her late husband who died from a suicide. This causes Machin to behave aggressively towards her, angry at the fact that she has rejected him. As a result he leaves the house and stays at a homeless men’s shelter. Later on in the film, Machin looks to reconcile with Margaret only to find out that she is unconscious in the hospital not too long after he left. She sadly dies from being unable to regain consciousness, leaving Machin all alone with her two children. We can see that Machin’s aggressive behavior as a negative factor because if he wasn’t occasionally violent towards Margaret he wouldn’t have had to leave the house and Margaret would never have become unconscious and would still be alive.

In conclusion we can see that aggression can have both positive and negative repercussions in life, depending on certain situations. I found this interesting because I believe that aggressive behavior shouldn’t be viewed as a negative factor if it used the correct way. “This Sporting Life” helped me see that aggressive behavior can have its benefits also.

Since the Haeler Echo Earthly Impressions screening was at full capacity I chose to see O Peixe by Jonathas de Andrade at the New Museum. The film was being screened in the backroom on the first floor in a room with 6 seats and a tinted glass wall on one side. I really liked that they had four speakers set up because the sound was really amazing, just the sound of the ambient waters and nature was super calming and Zen- feeling. I felt the film worked really well without any dialogue, and the sounds of the water and the fish made the piece even better. I really connected to this film, as I grew up in a beach town on Long Island and have been fishing my whole life. I found it so interesting the way these men soothed these fish to their deaths, and how the fish kind of just slowly died. Its such a different culture than what I was used to seeing, people tossing fish over the side of the boat and letting them flop and bleed all over the floor until they finally die. It was strange to see someone who was killing a creature for most likely to sell or to eat treating them with almost respect to take the time to sit there and wait for the fish to die. Each man had a slightly different fishing technique, like all fishermen do. Whether it was using a net, a sphere, or spool. They all also has their slightly different techniques while waiting for the fish to die. The man with the chain flipped the fish over and over again and one of the men even kissed the fish. I also really enjoyed when the focus was on the men’s body movements while fishing, it was very visually pleasing to see the muscle in the body being worked and used and only being able to see the mid section on the body left the eye drawn to nothing else. It was also nice when they focused on each fishermen’s eyes which made the experience more intimate.

I attended the screening presented by Flaherty NYC titled Tightly Bound Consciousness.  The screening was a combination of nine short films by several different filmmakers.  All the films deal with the physical and psychological mind.  However, I found each film dealt with the topic quite differently.  I realized after the first two films that I wouldn’t be able to have any expectations of what the upcoming films would be like because of the drastic difference between them.  The first film was called Outer Space by Peter Tscherkassky.  It used footage from a horror film but edited it so violently that by the end the footage had turned into blinding, flashing lights.  You lose all sense of what is happening and it even becomes quite uncomfortable.  The second film was called SHLOMO by Ruth Patir.  This film was shot like a documentary but the topic was demons that were inside people’s bodies.  My favorite film, however, was the last one shown.  It was called When You Awake by Jay Rosenblatt.  The film features black and white footage of a couple being hypnotized.  We are then taken into their unconscious mind where we see a variation of random and crazy things.  I enjoyed that this screening featured several short films instead of one long one.  Each film made me think of the human mind and our place in the world differently.  I couldn’t help but leave the theater asking questions like, what does it mean to exist?  What is real and what is happening only in our minds?  Is our own reality different from someone else’s?  Of course I have not answered these questions but I appreciate that these short films forced me to think of them.

I attended the BAMcinématek series Migrating Forms and saw the work of Jonathas de Andrade. At the theater there were about 50 people. I found De Andrade’s work interesting because the work centered around a similar theme of urbanization and modernity. They showed five of his works, O Levante (2013), 4000 Disparos (2010), Pacifico (2010), O Caseiro (2016) and O Pixie (2016). The first piece shown was O Levante which translates to Uprising. It was about the rural people racing in the urban streets with horses and carriages. It felt like it was recorded hand held while riding on one of the carriages, it was the 1st Horse-Drawn Cart Race in the Center of Recife (the city where Andrade is from).

The second piece 4000 Disparos was a ten minute clip of a sixty minute loop of male faces shot on super 8. The faces were shown alongside beeping noises that changed in pitch and pace sometimes, and so would the pace of the faces on the screen. While watching it at sometimes the faces all looked the same, you couldn’t get any distinct characteristic because of the speed of the shots. What I think Andradre intentions with the piece was to show how we all are the same, no man is different and that no man is better.

His next piece was an animation also shot on super 8 of an earthquake that removed Chile from South America and makes it into an island. Bolivia gets its water coast back which they lost in the Pacific War. In the animated piece all the problems because of war and violence is solved overnight by mother nature, which is a nice way to have problems be resolved for Bolivia.

The fourth piece shown was O Caseiro which means The Caretaker. The piece was about two men playing side by side on two different screens. It was like the Michel Gondry music video sugar water for Cibo Matto. The piece was in video in black and white. On the left it was a white writer and in the right is a black man I couldn’t tell his occupation. I researched the piece and the video on the left is Joaquim Pedro de Andrade’s The Master of Apipucos showing a day in the life of Gilberto Freyre in 1959. The right screen is in 2016 a caretaker who lives and works in that space. 

The two videos played in synchronization showing how the men differed because of their race and class but were similar. The writer worked by writing in books and laying around in his office full of books while the caretaker worked with his hands fixing radios and cleaning the house. They both appreciated nature as we see both walk slowly through the garden touching the flowers and just living in the space, which I found to be quite nice to watch. 

The last piece shown was O Pixie which translates to The Fish. The piece was about fisherman fishing. It was shot on 16mm and transferred to 2k video. The colors seemed almost painted on the screen it was aesthetically pleasing to me. There was no dialogue to the piece only the ambient sound of the lake they were fishing in. I found it interesting the method the fisherman used when catching the fish. They dominated the fish using a strong grip on them so they wouldn’t be able to squirm away but they also petted the fish. They held it close, affectionately and you could see the fish slowly die. It is the closest the fish would get to a peaceful death. I enjoyed this piece very much. 

If interested check out Andrade’s website to see more of his work http://www.jonathasdeandrade.com.br .

The Mapping Journey Project may seem simple at first glance, but once you delve into it, it opens up a complex world of geopolitical reality and struggles of individuals who just want to live a peaceful life and support their families. When I sat down in front of a screen and started listening to someone’s journey, my imaginations played a great part in experiencing the project. I would look at the pen moving across the map as my mind visualized their journey – whether it was through a desert or by boat or bus, I couldn’t help but imagine what it must have felt like – very captivating. The tone of their voices was very calm and casual as if they’re used to it.
My favorite moment was probably when a man tried to escape to Italy, but accidentally ended up in Turkey thinking that he was in Italy. The whole piece seemed refreshing and especially relevant now that I’ve read articles about the European refugee and migrant crisis and them being a generic mass of people – full of terrorists and slackers, looking to live on welfare – often very Islamophobic. That’s why the whole set up was so fitting – from afar, they’re all identical, impersonal projections, not until you sit down you can see how different all of the maps are and hear their experiences and stories and relate to them.