endless nancy

never stop dancing

More wishwife

Postcard front and back, I wanted the announcement to almost function autonomously from the work, something that could augment an understanding of it but also operate independently.





aaand these videos were rear projected on screens on the side of the gallery space

hey

focus!

lost in the microcosm

My favorite thing I helped make in highschool, with my favorite pals from highschool. Watching it now it seems to make more sense to me, something about loneliness, waiting, complex relationships. Right on.

flight path

Finals week and I know I have to learn to work when I'm not under crushing pressure from deadlines but here's what I came up with in my processing class, I'll continue to work on it. I like the idea:

nerp

raw material, in progress footage. I had to severely compress these to get them online, for the most part I really like the way that looks, but, I'm not sure it adds anything to these, maybe it's just too much...

The first video, the airplane one, is an excerpt, the whole piece is about an hour long, I'm not sure yet how I'm going to process it. I may add voiceover, I may integrate it into some larger piece. At any rate, I have a few ideas and really feel ready to take this stuff in a more finished direction... more to come, the sweet hooty days of winter break and final cut on my personal laptop await.

ten percent Dolly

Dolly Parton retains an inexplicable significance in my life.

The content that informs the emotional and cultural landscape of a certain place is something that I've been looking at recently. I find myself sitting with these complex associations I have with local newscasters, radio jingles from home, etc. Those associations are the only way this prescribed content gains any measure of specificity. There are archetypes present in this media that are somehow easy to internalize, for me anyhow, and important.

Country Music

mike "ringo" white

Mike "Ringo" White is an artist who lives and works in Milwaukee. He's untrained, if that distinction is important and works primarily with found/recycled materials.

I struggled a lot in the production of this short documentary, there are technical issues I have to resolve and content was something I found difficult to reconcile as well. I tried not to portray this person as a novelty but I also didn't want to make something completely sappy about the wonder of creativity (though, you know, that sort of thing is true, and, a part of this)

It reminds me of when, last year, I made this documentary about the presidential elections:



I intended it to be about more than just the election itself. I wanted to address the sorts of things people say in public vs. in private, in what situations people are willing to say what things and to relate that to political debate. It was fairly controversial (I got a lot of varied responses, few entirely or even mostly positive) I think because of the way I portrayed my peers, which could be construed negatively but, I still think in terms of what I set out to do, and in context, it worked to some degree.

But, based on the readings of this piece by my friends I made an alternate cut that I meant to address fairly literally the climate of election day. I may get around to uploading it sometime but it was less genuine, for me, more superficially hopeful, more of an obvious illustration of the sort of doctrine of change that was being purveyed at the time. I think I made it to redeem myself in the eyes of my peers as opposed to addressing a possibly more interesting thought, which it didn't.

Not to completely overanalyze the process...

Anyhow, I didn't want to do with the Ringo doc what I did with the second election video. I'm not sure if I've accomplished that. My feelings about outsider art, as a field, and this artist in particular, the comparison of his personality, life, and artwork changed considerably over the course of the process.

In conclusion, I think this is one I need to keep thinking about, feedback is appreciated, dialogue will hopefully ensue, and, I'll keep working out my ideas about it.

sound and video distortion distraction experiments

AHHH!

I made this:




and used it to make this:




AHHHHHH!!!! AHHhhHHhHHHhhhHHhH!!!!!!!

Sparr_ows

In between other projects I've been distracting myself with these goofy things, quick repetitive video and the associated sound that I process in a variety of ways. Mainly I just speed it up and recombine it and then speed that up or slow it down and combine it again and keep at that until I have something I'm happy with. These things seem to turn out better than my regular projects. eh.



but doesn't it make sense because birds are these strange robots by accident anyway?

bring a little water, sylvie

A few in progress things. I've been getting very little done over spring break but here's a sampling anyhow. The above is a mask I'm making out of fabric and wax. The fabric/wax combo was made by Danielle as a part of another project. Long story. School story. Boring. Below are a few quick clips from a video I'm working on for class as well. It's about the future, kind of, and space, kind of. It's going to be called "Visions of the Multiverse". I made the costume but I'm not entirely happy with it. ideas to explore further. Lotsa sniffles in this one. The static videos I posted earlier will probably be a part of this finished project as well



and some more:



sniff snifsnif, it was dag cold out.

Also, for kicks, here is my favorite video that I made in highschool. I used pictures of my mother and elements of this movie by Maya Deren, 'In the Very Eye of Night':



I don't think my mother operates in this way but when I made this I was imagining people holding onto their fondest moments and defining themselves by them. Maya Deren compared the movements of dancer's human bodies to the movements of stars which she described as being perfect. I compared the movements of constructed stars to images of a charming personal history vignette. Does that begin to make sense? I can't be sure. Here it is, the audio is a little poppy, I'll have to fix that sometime:

Installation

This is an installation I did at MIAD for class. I'm going to rebuild a set like this to shoot youtube videos in, more on that later. It's meant to act as the conceptualization of an interior, private space, and to reference classic sitcom type set conventions. More on this later, you may recognize some of the images from my earlier post SPACE MELT

I'd like to point out in the video the telephone that I circuit bent. In general I think of circuit bending as just a hobby, or something kids should do. but, I do like doing it and for this piece I bent a children's toy very simply; I added a few buttons and switches and a potentiometer. Things got really crazy because I decided I had enough knowledge of circuitry to try to wire the buttons of the phone to functions and bends on the toy. I thought I had it figured out but a lot of it got mixed up and confused. Still, pretty good for a first try and when you press three of the buttons they make weird noises, which is pretty sweet whether it was completely successful or not.

Feb_Monday004

Just got back from Minneapolis; here're some rhymes I wrote on the bus:

Baby you're just thrillin

like the coffee in brazil is

when they ask who's the illest

ya tell 'em _____ is