Stan Brakhage
meaning in perceived chaos
I have been looking into the works of Stan Brakhage in particular, two of his short films, Mothlight (1963) and The Dante Quartet (1987). both of these experimental pieces explore the idea of using the natural formulation of patterns that can be found in chaos to draw a deeper more personal meaning form a situation that on the surface seems impossible to rationalize.
the idea of finding meaning and direction within chaos is something that has come up a lot in my life and in particular the last few months with having to find ways to cope with the end of a long term relationship and life plans being thrown into the air, I am hoping to use this project as a way to help prosses and communicate the internal ‘Chaos’ that I have yet been able to put to words and create an opportunity for others to do the same.
Jamie Jenkinson
Jamie Jenkinson is an experimental video artist who works primarily with Iphones with the main aim of his work being to try and expose the errors and artifact` found in digital video, this is often achieved by shaking the camera to throw images out of focus.
after watching some of his work i think there are several core ideas that i am also hoping to represent within my work such as the reliance more on texture and colour than composition to invoke feeling, a good example of this is the clip linked below titled #CC0000
http://www.jamiejohnjamesjenkinson.com/2014/12/blog-post_24.html
when I showed this clip to several members of my class they all said it gave them an explainable feeling of unease because of the movement created by the static and noise
Hear are a few videos I tried in the style of jame jenkinson, I really like the feel of these clips and I think I will use them as some of the footage on the vhs tape loop
disintegration
loops
through my research into analogue signal destruction in video, my attention has been drawn to the destruction loops, a phenomenon that has recently been revived by several ambient musicians, that involves the disruption of audio signals through the destruction of the magnetic recording surface of the tape.
this concept was originally sparked by the disintegration loops made by William Basinski. while archiving old tapes Basinski noticed that the magnetic surface material began to flake off when the tape passed the play heads creating a natural sounding degradation in sound quality with parts of the recorded music flaking off altogether to progressively create an entirely new sound.
this idea has now been purposefully recreated by musicians such as Heinbach and Simon the magpie, because of the unpredictability of the destruction prosses the outcomes produced are different every time and serve as a way of generating a unique starting point for music creation.
I am hoping to experiment with tape loops myself and use the unpredictability to illustrate the way that even completely uncontrollable randomness can be used to create something with a sense of order with the intent of giving others a resource to do the same
William Basinski
William Basinski is an avant-garde composer based in New York City best known for his four-volume album The Disintegration Loops (2002–2003), the loops were created when Basinski was attempting to archive some of his earlier work that was recorded to tape on to a more long term and reliable digital storage device. as the tapes where played, he quickly discovered that because of the age of the tape and the way in which they had been stored the magnetic surface of the tape had begun to decay and parts of it flaked off and separated from the plastic backing as the tape passed over the play head, parts of the tapes where then spliced in to loops and allowed to run for extended periods of time creating the iconic natural and progressive decay heard on the album.
the eerie sound of The Disintegration Loops became cemented in pop culture of the early 2000s due to its completion coinciding with the 9/11 attacks that Basinski witnessed sat on the roof of his apartment building in Brooklyn with friends as the towers collapsed. The following morning he played "Disintegration Loop 1.1" as a soundtrack to the aftermath and subsequently decided to dedicate the work to the victims of the attack.
"the events gave new meaning to the musical pieces created by catastrophic decay in my studio a few weeks before."
it was this idea of processing decay and destruction through association with signal disruption is what lead me to the concept of using this project as a way to process represent and help come to terms with some of my own internal turmoil that I have been struggling to find an outlet for over the past few months through analogue video and sound technology a medium I understand and can control and manipulate.