Fields and Frames Briefing

On the 29th of January, we had our Fields and Frames briefing. Firstly, we went through our assessment criteria in an in depth way to try and pick it apart. A few things I picked up from this were:

- To innovate is to do a lot with a little. Start from simple things and build them up, you're doing things to create a difference and not to make imagery that looks like student work.

- Make sure you're aware of the critical, historical and theoretical framework in order to understand why you are making the pieces that you are making.

After this, Vicky (our lecturer) showed us some work that she felt to be relevant to the project and to the assessment criteria:

TV Interruptions: Tap Piece. This work by David Hall was screened on national television without warning to the public. This piece merely contains the act of a tap filling the frame, then water slowly drains diagonally across the frame. To me it feels as if the artist is trying to bring the audience's attention to the existence of the frame, in order to remind the audience that all they are watching is a TV set.

http://youtu.be/6h_5rSrZgL0

Turbulent By Shirin Neshat:

This piece is very simple, but very powerful in the way that it captures the audience and comments politically on a situation without the need to be literal.

We next looked at some artwork which is more on par with Vicky's own work as an artist. She uses celluloid a lot to make artwork, and so the following artworks are experimental with celluloid.

Dresden Dynamo By Lis Rhodes:

This piece was created by sticking transfers on to the film, and as well as creating pattern it also created sound when it went through the projector.

Night Sounding By Kayla Parker:

This film used already existing footage, and hand carving of the celluloid to create its own images and 'narrative'. I loved the neon in this piece, and the connection between the shapes carved and the real footage.

We were considering this idea of expanded cinema, and trying to come up with our definition of expanded cinema. Here are a few characteristics I wrote down:

- Multiple Technologies

- Screens

- Bodies

- Objects

- Live Events

- Think about the frame as a fixed thing. It can be any shape, it can go in and out.

From this lecture I was alerted to the idea of the frame being a malleable object. I liked watching the
examples of how you can manipulate celluloid to create a cameraless image. It has made me
consider how you could use the idea of form to create art, rather than focusing on subject matter.
However finding the balance between this and subject matter is something I have to reflect on
throughout my creative process.