Artist Research -- the Brothers Quay "Street of Crocodiles"

  

The Brothers Quay are twin American filmmakers who currently reside in England.  According to wikipedia they typically work with dolls that are in some form of degeneration and their work is often dark and brooding.  When I first started watching Street of Crocodiles, I wasn't really sure what to expect.  Sure the visuals were stunning, but I wasn't sure what I was supposed to get out of it. The opening sequence especially threw me for a loop. My guess is that it was to kind of set the story up as a fairy tale and romanticize the real problems that were being discussed. With that said...

I deduced that there was a deep longing coming from the doll characters for the life that was evident in the main character.  He was alive and his motions were fluid where their motions were jerky and they were empty.  They wanted the life that a man could bear, they tried creating their own kind (the light bulb man) but it merely fizzled out.  There was a scene in particular where all the doll characters were caressing objects that visually simulated sexual organs (the meat, the cloth with hair, the glove) that they wished they possessed but simply did not.  At the very end the simply begin to fall apart as everything becomes unscrewed, including their arms which began to jerk mechanically around.

It was interesting to see that what I'd thought was more or less correct when the narration came on in the end as there was no dialogue at all.  The mis en scene was absolutely stunning and entirely encompassing.  The symbolism was also very strong and I think that's something I really need to work on. I need to find out what all of my materials mean to me and what their function is within my work. I think that will help strengthen my images, but I am a little worried about going over board because I don't want something strange happening in every image. I do want a sense of normalcy to be apparent in some but... I guess we'll see how that works out!

Film Stills courtesy of Google Images

Artist Research -- David Lynch's "Blue Velvet"

So today I watched David Lynch's film Blue Velvet (1986) and was really excited about the whole thing.  It was very engaging and although it was two hours, the story flew by effortlessly. Although I'd been told to watch this movie before, and actually I already had it at home courtesy of netflix, Jeff had recommended that I watch it.  I'm pretty sure he said to pay attention to how David Lynch uses oddities in his work and figure out why its successful in his context.

One thing that was clear was that the oddities didn't seem random, but rather meticulously thought out. It lends to the narrative in terrifying and unsettling ways. The viewer is made to feel awkward -- as if they are not meant to see what they are seeing (i.e. Dorothy Valens undressing then dropping to the floor and inhaling the carpet, also getting up and stumbling down the hallway trailing her hands along the walls. We are made to feel what Jeffrey Beaumont must be feeling). They also only seem to happen in connection with Valens. When she isn't involved in the action everything is seemingly normal.  In fact, as the film progresses, the pieces of the film that are a little off kilter become normalized (i.e. Ben bursting into song -- "Candy Coated Clown") and doesn't seem at all out of place.

What makes all of the weird moments successful though, is that they don't have to justify their existence within the film, they can just be.  I don't need to know why Frank inhales with that little plastic mask, all I really need to know is that he is one messed up guy that is causing grief for Dorothy and Jeffrey. They become part of the narrative and necessary for the story to progress because of the tension that is created which is what definitely drives the story.

So as far as my work goes, I think what I need to do is make sure that the weird elements that I add to my images have to be necessary for the images to work. I'd also like to create a tension between my subject and the weird bits in order to really bring the images together.  I've gotten some good thoughts from this and I'm excited to put them into action.