doccu-what?
Monday, January 22nd, 2007saturday, i had a very interesting meet with one professor at the scm, wei sihiyu, louisa, which made me question. question myself, my motives for being here, my direction…she asked “so, what do you want to learn here?” and i couldnt really say, “i want to learn narrative storytelling. i want to learn doccumentary, i want to learn, how to scheme and plan…” even though that’s much wha ti really want. you see, she teaches these things, and might be one wmoan form whom i can learn quite a lot. yet, i could only say that i am really here to develop, what i already know…and i am relly interested in the procedural animation…
last semester, i worked with linda lai, developing one idea i have long had, the media i ching. this was supposed to be about creating specific elements, media objects which described aspects of the iching. i thought and thought and thought most of the semester, how to do this and what about it, nad in the end, i dont htink i cam up with such the great thing. i sorted out some video, did some flash and smil programming, and made the iching forms, but, linda and i both agreed, it didnt really break new ground, artistically speaking…see for yourself media i ching
i showed louisa a few videos, one of miho iwata dancing in the snow, one of my japanese friends’ sound performances in berlin, and one from yunnan, the indigo dyer see these here and she looked at my paintings. also we spoke some of her projects. louisa said to me, my editing is very good, that i draw the suspense ot of my images, which made me very proud, because this lady seems very critical. yet, it seemed my works were too short, and didnt really fit the idea of doccumentary, in particular of performance : performer, performance, audience (or something like that).
i realized, talking to louisa, i know almost nothing about doccumentary, and i never made a video in a proper way. i always just go, shoot video, like photographs, taking in the world around me, or the performance. sometimes a performance offers me not enough, in terms of imagery or focus, so i dont cut a video from it. i go through my footage, and edit together the ‘good bits’ and come up with my video art pieces. no planning, no concept, the only storytelling comes in the edit, where i usually find one element which draws the images together. sometimes, the story i tell, is totally disjointed from the reality which i doccumented, a fly buzzing before the lamp, a member of the audience acting odd, and my story is in the end, a fiction.
thought she may have liked my little videos, i felt, they were poorly, just videos, not doccumentarys, and wouldnt stand up to much criticism. at least, she liked the edit, but i didnt feel confident, to take any one piece beyond three minutes. i am pretty anxious, to show her, the disparate elements of the movie we ‘tried’ to make with a group last semester. we planned, storyboarded, wrote and discussed so much, then shot a bunch of stuff, and none of it came out like i wanted. i tried a rough edit, and had to give up, like 10 of the original 12 people in th e group. louisa laughed, and said, show her what i got, and she will tell me if it is salvageable…ha ha, and i will, even thought i fear the verdict will crush my intentions to make such pieces.
that laughter continued, and made me question, even further…louisa said, what, in the end, you had two people left in the group? well, thats’ not bad…two out of 12…hmmmm. different perspective, that, i was bummed, that in the end, it was just, max and vasco..,but maybe she has a point.
ok, off to school now, and i am late!!
ciao