http://virb.com/cinemateus Virb 2.0 (@cinemateus) en http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/7059144 Christmas came by and stayed awhile. It felt strangely unChristmas-like. It sure was nice though. We had a BATTLE MONSTERE day on the 23rd which was pretty good. Will hopefully be editing that and posting to lastfm pretty soon. I didn’t manage to get the ZINE out as Photoshop killed it just as I was finishing it. Lost everything. SAVE REGULARLY KIDS! So it’ll happen when it happens. Still not over Christmas enough to check my emails... However, must order book today if possible to have any chance of receiving it before the deadline. Hence, this is the last addition.

The next couple of weeks I shall write up my essay on Poussin and Weerasethakul. Listening to interview with Weerasethakul on Dailymotion, playing Fear and Loathing OST in background. Very cool juxtaposition. Although I suspect Jefferson Airplane -White Rabbit could do that to almost anything. I will also, finally, put paint to canvas, confirm Spencer and Doldrums locations and get filming. Hopefully I will be able to film the Pool as well. Although that now requires a letter from my tutor.

My friend Nate came back from Aberdeen briefly. After the BM day him and P came over and we watched a film he had sent to me a few months previously. The film had sat unwatched due to it’s terrible cover and blurb. However, Harold and Maude is a brilliant film. Very funny, zany, honest and life-affirming. It was a very nice evening indeed.

--

It didn’t seem right. People were dying and no one was helping them. People were fighting and no one could stop them. Their children hated them for being so stupid. In the end they made the same mistakes and their children hated them even more. They didn’t have any children because there was no time.

--

I shall post pre 2010 I’m sure.

Peace.

Rain, rain, rain.
Rein, deer.
Rain, dear.]]> Sun, 27 Dec 2009 06:40:43 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/7059144 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6929004 Yet another blogless week.

I can explain. I have been spending a lot of time sorting out the book, hopefully finding the right actor for the part of Spencer, trying to negotiate the pool!! sorting out the film collective site and generally getting caught up in the Christmas feeling.

So hopefully all the actors are cast for The Doldrums now. I am just trying to figue out the best locations for the shoot. It should go ahead in January. I have been trying to edit the footage from the auditions but Final Cut went and broke. So, I’m reinstalling it, but that has failed several times already and is currently on the third attempt!

The Film Collective now has a new home at thefilmcollective.org. dot.tk offer a very good service and it’s a shame that it’s looked down upon so much. thefilmcollective.tk will still work. We had 30 separate visitors from the USA one day in december apparently.

Went to Borders yesterday. Hadn’t anticipated the scale of the sale and the interest it had generated. The store was packed with people, the shelves stripped of their treasure. It was an incredible feeling to be in there buying all these books. I came away with an oddly Penguin published mostly Russian authored collection of books. I am currently delving into the collection of short stories by Chekhov that I received for my birthday and very much enjoying it. Also Dr. Zhivago completely amazed me when I first read it about five years ago. It is also very sad to see this book store go, as much as I disliked going there and seeing hordes of people gathered in the Starbucks, with muffins and mugs plumed high with cream, their lack of good film literature and other stupid faults. These were probably all things that just made me feel less special about being in a bookshop. Further removed from the cosy independent book shop image, lost in some alcove with a precious book. Hopefully the removal of the bigger book store chains will open up the stage for the indie book shops a bit more. All this is even more relevant to me now as I have managed to incur kind of a large fee at the Leicester Library and going back will mean I have to pay it. (Obviously I will return the books, but I still haven’t read them. And I did renew them again, it was just I forgot to straight away, several times.) Besides the library books never escape that faint smell of faeces and the pages are grimy.

The ZINE will be here by Christmas. For sure.

Bah, I have to write a letter now to tell someone why I need to film nude people in their swimming pool. The price has doubled too. This is when I seriously weigh up my financial sitch, and exactly the reason that I probably won’t be able to leave home next year. HUMMMMMBUG

Also check out the forum or filmcoll website as there are reviews aplenty.]]> Mon, 21 Dec 2009 06:36:03 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6929004 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6778064 Oh no! A whole week and no blog.

Went with P to see the Yeah Yeah Yeahs in Birmingham on the wednesday. They were really good. The support band got the place moving and their Montreal robot style and the singer’s ten year old girl outfit and haircut got all the teen scenesters very excited. The YYYs however are just cool. So cool. And seeing them live didn’t tarnish this image at all, just improved it. The band played really tight, barely pausing between songs and playing songs old and new. Karen O has a crazy growl, a bit like Tom Waits. Her outfits and the stage setup with multiple explosions of confetti made it very visual. Seeing them was great. We even bought T shirts. First band tee I have ever had!

On Friday, went with P to see Where The Wild Things Are. I had been waiting so long for this film! I have still not managed to write my thoughts about it. However they will appear soon, on the forum! I think it has something to do with how personal it felt. I haven’t seen another film that expressed those kind of feelings that I felt myself at that age and still now in a strange kind of way.

Seeing A Serious Man tonight hopefully.

Have been working on a redesign of The Film Collective site. Hopefully now it will be more useful!

I’m almost up to speed with the book. Haven’t even tried laying out the photos yet! Although I have decided that I will take them all through Photoshop first. I still have a whole lot of reading to do, and as quickly as possible as I have an essay to write.

Had another tutorial on Friday which was useful as we spoke about ways of presenting the Pool film which I had not thought about in that way before. I also have some naked people to track down.

ZINE is on it’s way. I promise. Although it is to be a slimmed down publication owing to pre-christmas madness. Expect the full ZINE force in Jan. This imminent release will be quite spectacular though.]]> Mon, 14 Dec 2009 09:31:45 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6778064 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6623422 I am well into the journal/blog to book process now! Using the website blurb.com to compile everything and so far so good. I didn’t think I’d have enough time to do all the printing and binding myself this time and Blurb seems to provide a very good frame to work within. I have also made a photo book for the last couple of years, but am including the photos in this book this time around as it seems to make more sense.

On friday I went and checked out the windows that I hope to film through for my Pool film. It is a really great space down there and filming should be very interesting. I hope to shoot on super8 which I ordered last week and miniDV. I’m now trying to find some willing volunteers to be in the film! My friend Ben is in it alone so far. Could be interesting.

I have been listening to a lot of Ludovico Einaudi over the weekend. Finally searched his name after hearing the advert for his forthcoming release every half an hour. Second successful piece of Spotify advertising I have encountered. The music feels very cinematic and the kind I would love to see/feel performed live. So that’s keeping me going.

Went to London on sunday with P, who has already written a pretty darn good write up of it on her blog. So I’ll just talk about the art. First up we hit Anish Kapoor at The Royal Academy. After a long wait outside due to the last weekend rush, we were in. It was incredibly busy and quite strange to be part of such a mass of people viewing the work. This really came in to effect with the big mirrored pieces Non-object series (2008-9) which had people laughing and smiling and confused all together. And probably due to all the hype and the TV program there was an assumed feeling that the work was to be revered, which happily didn’t interfere with the open and physical kind of responses that the work required. As P writes in her blog the place was downright dusty. This really ruined the effect of some pieces, especially, Yellow (1999) where dust had collected on the inside of the concaved surface. Would have been nice to experience the work at a quieter time but it was still delightfully overwhelming and full of ‘vulva-like’ (as the program puts it) forms. The experience of the colour is very strong and there is a sense of space that makes the viewer involved on a level that most sculpture I have seen does not. I think it has to do with this, quoted form Kapoor in te program, ‘If the traditional sublime is beyond the picture plane deep in space, then these works propose a contemporary sublime exists in front of the picture plane, not beyond it. I make these works because I feel this is a new spatial adventure. To make new art you have to make new space.’ And this links in with how Clement Greenberg describes the role of sculpture in a quote I will quote and reference in the comments. But it talks of how this came from cubism which was an attempt at inverting the picture plane in a way that hadn’t really been explored in painting before then. And this is very relevant to filmmaking and the history of the moving image as an art. In the 60s and 70s there was a movement of expanded cinema which was kind of a repeat what had happened in painting. People were thinking about this space in front of the image rather than pulling the viewer into a place beyond. But this is what I am writing an essay about. And it’s also what my films are about. So for now, no more.

Next was Raven Row where there was an exhibition of the work of Harun Farocki who is a very interesting video artist whose work I am only recently really aware of. His work has become an example of the possibilities of constructing a work of art around an exposing of society and the true nature of political ideas. there is a link to the right of a very good ‘monograph’ of Farocki’s work and style. We didn’t have much time as were meeting an actress straight after so the only film we saw in full was Immersion (2009), Farocki’s latest piece. It is an incredible document of the methods taken by US military to ‘treat’ soldiers who have had traumatic experiences. I felt terrible watching this soldier be put through it. When I was reading the aforementioned article I realised how Immersion sounded like it could be appropriate for the RADAR memory film screening. So, I emailed Farocki and he seems to have agreed. Not confirmed everything yet, but it is looking good. It was funny that the two films I tried to get included for the screening were both two channel projections. And whilst Tribe felt the dual projection setup was integral to the work, Farocki, so far at least, seems happy to present it however possible. And that is one of the very challenging decisions that must be made with the moving image.

So, following Raven Row, it was Tate Modern. Possibly due to the installation in the turbine hall it was very dingy and almost as dusty as Kapoor’s Yellow. Still, Miroslaw Balka’s How It Is (2009) was an incredible space, full of dark. Once again the amount of people there had an effect. Possible because so many of them were breaking the rules and taking pictures with annoying cameras with sculpture ruining flashes! Bah. I could understand what I had read about the links to the holocaust and could feel the sincerity of it all but more than that, it felt like a very profound space and one which could be quite peaceful if in there alone. no time for the rest of the art here, met L an actress auditioning for The Doldrums. She was really good and we’ll hopefully be overcoming the long distances to have her in the film.

A fair bit of lifeguarding this week, film collective site redesign, Yeah,Yeah,Yeahs, essay to hand in, book to compile, ZINE, canvas to make. Ya know.

Peace.]]> Mon, 07 Dec 2009 08:49:00 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6623422 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6504397 Had first group tutorial today. The tutor Mark was very impressive, full of knowledge, inspiration and ideas. It was good to find about the work of a few of my peers and find out more about my own work. The conversations in your head can risk missing the point, but when a few other people get involved then it tests the whole thing more. So I have a few artists to look up and a couple more books. I already topped up my reading list on monday with the addition of a collection of texts by Clement Greenberg and the Philosophy of Aesthetics. Greenberg was picked to develop my understanding of the essay I was pointed to a few weeks ago about modern painting. It has already proved very interesting in it’s discussion of new sculpture (America, 1940s) which I felt tied in with film quite nicely and maybe explained some of my recent inclination to the medium. I must be getting somewhere though as I arrived in the studio today feeling like I could paint something. Am going to scavenge some paints and have a go. Experiment.

The whole Poussin - JOE debate is feeling quite interesting and I enjoy peoples reactions when I attempt to explain the whole thing as it seems to get them thinking and that’s good.

Another point to be taken from the tutorial was Mark’s reference to the trend for beauty. I wrote on the blog back in Sep/Oct about my realisation of the trend of ‘beautiful’ and an exhausted ‘sublime’. Since then I have read up on Kant and discovered a bit more about the sublime. the recent BBC series on beauty also confirms this thinking. I am curious as to the effect this has on the artist. Really these ideas should only change the critic. But that implicates the viewer, as they inevitably see through the critic’s eyes. But really the two terms should not be interchanged freely with the trends. Beauty should be reclaimed from misuse. Although it is essentially a far more encompassing term than the sublime. That sublime has a credited father in Kant adds suspicion to it’s possible reach for me. Beauty seems a more eternal idea, more natural. They should be used alongside each other. X is sublime for these reasons and is an example of beauty for these.
note- i haven’t yet watched the said series (i am suspicious of the recent slew of art programs) although I intend to and my reading on both terms is still fairly limited.

Also happening today was a very long conversation with Daniel about several elements of my work. Daniel is very good at grasping ideas and asking further questions so following the tutorial my mind was pushed even further into unknown territory. Also spoke with Chris about setting up a discussion group. Hopefully involving fellow LUSAD students discuss an artist, term or anything for some period of time occasionally. Discussion opens you up to so many possibilities that it would be a shame not to get all the good dialogue between us all a little organised.

The course requires 200 hours of work for this semester. Gladwell reckons 10000 hours is about right to become a genius so I guess they aren’t pushing us that hard.

Going to test film equipment at pool on friday.
Second auditions tomorrow. Very excited.

Went to woods with P earlier. She was taking photos but I took a few of her too. Edited in Photoshop. I have really under-appreciated Photoshop in the past. Trying to mend my ways and break allegiance to iPhoto. (you might be able to see the full image if you click it... i’m not sure.)

Peace]]> Tue, 01 Dec 2009 12:56:52 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6504397 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6459655 This weekend has whizzed by. Managed to get some of the first essay assignment done. Am comparing and evaluating the stance that art publications take on the moving image through a website, journal and book. When we were first given the assignment I had thought it would be really interesting to use a novel. However I still haven’t finished Ulysses and most of my reading of late has been essays and that kinda thing.

Also did a few zine pages and tinkering with some new Battle Monstere material. The zine is looking pretty good with some great contributions so far. Have been trying to figure out a possible venue for a Film Collective live soundtrack accompaniment event...

Was nice to slow down for a couple of days. Kicking things off sharp tomorrow with work early early in the morning, then uni, then work again. Oh well.

Just raided the Observer Music Monthly magazine for any new listening treasures. Fairly successful although I have already been emjoying a slew of new music via Tilos Roadmovie blog (google it) which I hadn’t checked for a while.

Still rusty with my basketball. Feel faster but clumsy and less fluid. Need to get some more practice in. It is nice to be playing again though.

P and I are off to London next weekend to check out some galleries. Hopefully hitting Kapoor at the Royal Academy and Farocki at Raven Row. Need to look up what else is happening.

---

I sat there and watched our intertwined lives
pass by with a cliche soundtrack
and felt like an American TV show.
And that was okay.
It was perfect and it didn’t matter.

-

The metal boxes talk.
Discarded trees grow dusty, yellow in light.
We move in, connect.
Forget, drown out, drown.
Scattered, those blinded by darkness
and those blinded by light.

--

STRAUSS!]]> Sun, 29 Nov 2009 12:26:49 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6459655 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6406310 Orange Sherbet DVD was a nightmare on tuesday. Tim and I have never spent the required weeks reading the heavy tomes that accompany Final Cut Studio Pro and so whenever a showcase deadline pulls in close and we are trying to conjure up multiple film projecting layouts and sequences there is a very noticeable air of uncertainty. The problem lies in exporting the sequences and then burning them onto disc. Both stages can take several hours. On Tuesday both stages went wrong several times. In the end we were a couple of videos short but at least the DVD worked. And, the projection fitted to the windows we had hoped it would. Getting this right was quite a surprise. We had measured the windows, then drawn them in photoshop and scaled them down to fit within a video frame. We then took this into final cut and put the videos on top. So it worked out. It was a good night too. The Vanilla Galleries/Orange Tree combo is nice and refreshing and arty.

Auditions went well. There weren’t many people and so the auditions ended up being between individuals and Poco and me. Although I had imagined going through the whole script and acting out some of the scenes this seemed a bit pointless when I actually read the script from a producers perspective. Turns out that only two of the characters really do the talking. With this in mind, we ended up getting auditionees to read the main role with P taking the other and me supplying the other lines. It was very exciting to try out the process of casting. The lecture theatre I hired to hold the auditions also had quite an effect. It made the whole thing quite serious and it felt as if the actors were approaching it with a kind of respect and really relishing the chance to prove their art. Maybe that was just me getting carried away. It was good though to see the actors in this situation before going into rehearsals or filming though. It has also given me a few things to think about with the screenplay. Might tweak some parts before the auditions next week. I filmed most of it as well. Will play it back and see how the dialogue works in a more abstract setting. Felt very happy with the afternoon and proud of P ‘cos she did good.

In the evening we met Tim in Leicester and headed to a filmmakers meeting at the Phoenix. It was a really good experience and they have a group of very enthusiastic and active filmmakers all helping each other out. Very nice was their point that they wanted us to be The Film Collective and they wanted to be 5x7 and keep our own identities, yet still work together. The focus is just about filmmaking and making sure we all do so to the best of our abilities. So that was good.

Back in the studio today. Trying to arrange testing out the film equipment at the pool. Made another quick sculpture. Which led to several hours scribbling in my journal pontificating on the relevance of the sculpture and film and painting and life. I have never thought about things like I am now before. It feels good.



Just happy to be.


Me and P have now been together for 2 years. That’s one tenth of my life. I like that.

Tomorrow need to get some info on lenses... And screen printing workshop hopefully (depends on some other people forgetting to turn up!)

Ciao]]> Thu, 26 Nov 2009 12:20:02 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6406310 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6330692 Helped filming with Shona Illingworth friday and saturday evening. She has been commisioned by RADAR to do some installation film pieces. The sequence I was helping with involved a very high end underwater camera and sound equipment following Charlie, a swimmer for the UK team, as he swam lengths. It was a very fun shoot with plenty of problems to think about and solve. Gave me a few hints as to my own underwater project. The work opens on 2nd December at the Pilkington Library I believe.

“This new work uses sound, film and text to explore the dynamic interplay between imagination,emotion and memory. It examines how the fragmentary experience of memory can challenge our capacity to form coherent narratives for the past. What happens to a person when they are unable to construct a rational account for a persistent and deeply troubling memory?The film shows a swimmer struggling through dark water, intercut with sweeping images of a dark brooding forest.
We hear the voice of a Soviet conscript recounting details of a terrifying exhaustion, which induces a dangerous state of hallucination, while on night patrol at the edge of a vast snow-covered pine forest.”
-http://www.arts.lboro.ac.uk/radar/whats_on/shona_illingworth/

It was very interesting to see how Shona directed the shoot. She was very good at trying out a movement and explaining which bits were working and why.

Have also been doing some sketches for Tim’s project that he is presenting to a record company this week! Very exciting and a great idea so I hope it works out.

P has had a pretty good response to the audition dates. So I just need to tweak the script a bit more and hopefully it will go well on wednesday and we’ll find some actors and get a first feel for the flow of the piece.

Am now going to Tims to sort out the DVD for Orange Sherbet which is tomorrow!

The middle link on right is to a video by Kerry Tribe who I will hopefully be contacting re screening the work at the RADAR film screening in January. Whether or not we do show it, it is very good. So watch it now! Reminds me of an expanded version of that scene in I heart Huckabees when she asks, ‘have you ever transcended space and time?’

-‘Yes. No. Uh, time, not space. No, I don’t know what you’re talking about.’]]> Mon, 23 Nov 2009 04:15:05 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6330692 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6258385 Audition invites sent out yesterday. P is helping produce this thing and it’s nice to have someone else helping out on this kind of stage. It’s exciting to actually be attempting this kind of stage also.

Filming this morning turned Burt into a no-go. Had been having doubts about it from the start but still wanted to push it and see an outcome. In the end no one was willing to read it on camera. I did however meet a squirrel man who made the morning worthwhile and special. Ended up filming him and his squirrels and a few other sequences.

Watched Imagine... on iplayer last night. It was focused on Anish Kapoor’s show at The Royal Academy and was very interesting. His explanation of why he was doing art and what it was all about was really inspiring and resonating most of all, ‘no compromise’. It is so hard to avoid compromising in film. Like this morning. It even applies to collaboration though. If people have opposing views, an expansive discussion should follow with one more developed/reasoned view being embraced by both people. It also developed my understanding of sculpture quite dramatically and I ended up forming a piece in the studio today. It is composed of two weaving frames and a metal rod balancing around a corner space. (obviously influenced by Dan Flavin’s Corner Piece 1969, which I saw at Tate Liverpool) And I think it involves the viewer in the way Kapoor was saying he aims for, which is exactly how I feel with the moving image.

---

Just saw, cold path, winter in the sun.
Little boy trundles past, says hi.
World snaps into perspective.

Passing squirrel man, go have a chat.
Innocence. See you pal.

--

Musty glow.


pic up top from fair photography adventure in car park. an interior.]]> Thu, 19 Nov 2009 10:34:06 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6258385 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6212971 Another day of emails!

Am now listening to Olafur Eliasson talk on TED.com. Very interesting ideas about the author and viewer and interaction etc. Have been trying to research some artists for the Radar project as we have a meeting tomorrow. Keep getting back to several quite renowned artists so securing them for this exhibition could be hard!

Tomorrow is also the Orange Tree gathering of the Film Collective which is quite scary/exciting. Hopefully some good ideas and connections will come of it. To follow we are hopefully doing the improvised film session, eventually.

But before that emails must be sent to inform people of the auditions for The Doldrums.

Planning to film BURT on thursday. B is about a time travelling man who screwed up. I realised I had written it with Burt being quite an old man and would therefore need to find an old man. This could prove to be quite tricky. So, I am going to try and find lots of old folk to read the script to the camera and splice them all together. This decision came from my interest in the flow between narrative and ‘behind the scenes’ documentary style segments in the work of Apichatpong Weerasethakul and how this relates to when brushstrokes are visible in a painting and the extreme setting of Synecdoche, New York (but there’ll be an essay about that.)

Now, Rob Forbes on ways of seeing. Ted.com is a very good resource indeed.

Pic up top from meteor watching last night. No meteors. Didn’t manage to take many photos as the batteries ran flat very quickly.

Strudel]]> Tue, 17 Nov 2009 11:15:14 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6212971 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6169987 An exciting weekend despite lack of filming expedition. In the end we just couldn’t muster the acting peoples and when it looked like we could, the weather turned bad.

Did however get to spend almost whole time with P and we went photographing, film watching and poster making mental. P aint been photogging for long but she sure is finding her groove pretty quick, has a real feel for it. which makes it very fun.

---

Watched Synecdoche, New York one night which was a very interesting/good/funny film. I shall write about it on the forum!

---

Just had filmtalk with Tim. He has a very interesting project in the works and is helping me develop The Doldrums stuff a bit.

---

Checked out the pool earlier for ‘that’ project. Will do it.

A short blog, yes. What can I say.

The real darkness falls not with the night,
Some flight of the heart,

Strudel, the noodle.
Rude little poodle.

Happiness fades,
Never.


----
pic from said photog adventure.

ps. will be trying out this new colour coordination for a few posts maybe. If you exist, feel free to comment appreciation of change or vent rage at change. Your choice.]]> Sun, 15 Nov 2009 13:08:52 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6169987 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6132149 Apologies for the delay in this blog and the fact that it probably wasn’t worth the wait.

Have been very busy this week and it doesn’t look like things will be slowing down for a while. So what’s cooking?

The Doldrums. Have been advertising for actors and trying organise some auditions. The search has been quite successful in bulking up the film collective membership although it has also drawn a lot of applications from people in London which could make things expensive. Have been trying to work on the screenplay a bit more as I feel it is probably short of a few scenes.

Radar. Have been getting involved with a curatorial role in an upcoming film screening with these guys. They are the Loughborough University arts programme. Am hoping to convince some video artists whose work I have found really interesting/important/influential to exhibit! I am also attending the shoot of one of the artists, Shona Illington, who is working with Radar this season, next week. It involves underwater filming! This is very relevant, as I had an idea involving underwater filming at the beginning of the week. I have reached the point in the organisation of the shoot for my own idea where I have to decide if i can afford to make it (£100)...

Orange Sherbet. Usual mad scramble for nonexistent films ensuing. Might be helped by tomorrow’s ‘improvised filmmaking’ session... Also trying to figure out a fairly interesting screening which involves projecting the films simultaneously and having them move around...

Essays... These are set pieces of work that we have to do. Mine are very linked to my studio work (studio work seems a very irrelevant term). They are a continuation of my exploration into the relationship between the static and the moving image, and also narrative and authorship... I think. The Doldrums, Radar work and these essays are all influencing each other a great deal.

The Film Collective sign up event is happening next week, 18th @ Orange Tree in Lestaarr. Lots of members yay. It is really gathering momentum on the membership side with a lot of response to the posters and facebook. Studio trail has gone slightly cold, and battle with funding has not even begun!

Will hopefully get some more blog action. Now, film collective meeting.

Mango


-Pic up top shot on photography workshop today. (we were using Nikon d50s i think. Very different to my Pentax. Menu functions very nice but highly annoying focus ring that pulled itself out of place if you were trying to manually focus. and when it did focus it did so to a point on the right hand side of frame. weird)


]]> Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:04:58 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/6132149 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5935265 so, pulled it all together... issue 2 of the parisoir zine is now available,
EISENZINE

Features great stuff from Tim, his grandpa, Livi and P. Is very fun making this little zine. Need to find some additional contributors though if we hope to get it consistently made and released.

Lots of reading at present. Just added, ‘Film and Philosophy’ and ‘Art and the Moving Image: A Critical Reader’ to the list. Still debating whether or not to take a break from Ulysses! Have so many other novels I would like to read. Including Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry which I picked up at the Bluecoat in Liverpool after seeing an exhibition of work all done in response to the novel. Had the idea that I could write the novel as I imagine it must be, before reading the thing. Could be interesting... Maybe a later blog post will hold that trinket.

Designed fliers and poster for film collective. Our current plan is to recruit as many folk as possible and get some projects running. Doldrums is going ahead! I put an add on castingcall and have a lot of interest from people in London which may not be very useful. I had also hoed to find local people whom can become involved in the film collective. I even added the French parts to the screenplay now.

It is nice to be working in the studio at the moment, despite the cold. It is nice to see people getting in to their own stuff and there seems to be a constant dialogue between different people explaining their ideas and developing them in the process.

Might be doing quick film shoot with Tim at the weekend, hopefully just some improvised bits with a couple of actors and different costumes. Maybe next weekend instead.

Will blog again soon.
Check out P’s blog in the meantime.

Peace]]> Wed, 04 Nov 2009 09:25:19 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5935265 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5867471 i am now back.

Italy was amazing. Lucca is a magical town. It has a feeling of complete detachment from the outside world.
A high medieval wall circles the skyward reaching buildings.

-there is a sense of being cut off,
different, an independent state.
Without need for the outside world.
No desire to escape walls,
They hold a strange comfort.

Our apartment was very high and overlooked most of Lucca with church spires being the only buildings reaching higher.

Lucca gave me a lot to think about. It’s a very busy place, seemingly holding a different festival each week. Just whilst we were there they had, the Puccini festival, Film festival, Comic festival, mini Art festival, huge antiques market, Organ festival... Mental. They have about six cinemas. Which seems insane for the size of the place, but hey. Went to see La Doppia Ora, avec ma mere et pere. It is an Italian film and very good. I really enjoyed the experience of seing a film in a language I didn’t understand without subtitles. It forces you to (or maybe it gives you space to) read the cinematic language used more. Despite all the twists in the film it was still possible to do this and it was very enjoyable. Started me thinking about the way language is used in film. I have a loose idea about making a short film with a made up language, my feeling that language is a gesture. The little cinema we saw it in was full of charm; balcony seating, slightly warped screen projector switching to 4:3 all by itself, old Lucchesian couples, complimentary sweets at the ticket desk and sharp neon blue lighting that appeared as the credits rolled.

I am still hung up about the whole medium of film. However we are being pushed towards exploring mediums we are less used to at uni. I feel I need to get my head around this film business though. I’m sure I will find some use for my newly acquired welding skills.

The Liverpool trip followed my Lucca adventure and after snatching a few yumi days with P it was back to walking unknown streets, looking for galleries and seeking inspiration/knowledge/adventure in equal measure.

Was very excited to find a Poussin on show at The Walker Gallery. Have fallen for Poussin’s landscapes with all their narrative possibilities, lighting, characters, style...... after being introduced through Sight Of Death by T.J.Clark. I even bought a slide of the good Poussin. I saw good as there were in fact two and the other one was an early piece that was very clunky, boring, blah. They have a great collection at the Walker and I was also drawn to the J.M.W Turner’s. Very special. The Bridget Riley exhibition was also very impressive. As was the cathedral, the Tate and Fact. I will write up some stuff about these over the week.

I enjoyed sitting outside a coffee shop on the docks, warm sun on my face, ichatting P.

Made some kind of film in the hotel lobby. ! Was fascinated by the place with it’s big band music accompanying elderly couples dressed up in the notion of splendour as they make their way from bridge game to ballroom.

New zine this wednesday. Although I really screwed up and lost the pen for wacom tablet!

Sign up form for film collective available on main page. (oh boy have we got our work cut out with that!)

Moment this morning where i was Jason Schwartzman’s character in Fantastic Mr.Fox, I can fight my own battles.

-no you can’t.]]> Sun, 01 Nov 2009 09:34:17 -0800 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5867471 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5527071 Occasionally things start happening very fast and for a while they don’t stop.

Music allows you to dance through these times with (if not control then) a focus and style.

Watching Tacita Dean: Artist’s Talk, on Tate website. It’s pretty interesting.

Hopefully seeing Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus tomorrow avec Poco with pie to follow to be sure. Following that I shall be departing for Italy! So no blog for a week. Might squeeze one in when I return before I again depart for an adventure in Liverpool. Quite exciting although will miss Poco muchly.

Keep thinking I can hear my phone ringing, ‘dude, dude. Dude!’ oh my.

First attempt at using Kodak Zi8 with Final Cut. Result, plays at correct framerate unlike Quicktime. Buut takes long render time as hi-def. Okay, too long. Well I still think Zi8 will be useful for recording stuff and testing stuff, it just doesn’t look particularly able to stand in for good ol’ minidv.

Right.

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I hold you close.

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Wistful wisps wrap softly around, unnoticed, unwound, gone.

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All mixed up in the onion skin of time.
Each a memory, fading.

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Might not blog before I go.
If this is so,
I’ll write you soon,
My blogosphere platoon.

Ciao]]> Thu, 15 Oct 2009 12:42:43 -0700 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5527071 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5455557 monday and week looking b u s y. reworked film collective site. and that is now online. well it will be by the time you read this. maybe not. the website is being skrewy.

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Italy next week. Should be interesting and stuff. Sure will miss Poco though. times a million.

Art is going okay. Group kind of just getting on with it all now. Our clock mechanism doesn’t really work and we are going to need a lot more paper to cover the walls in lots of layers. A few cracks deepening in the team, but I think we should hold out.

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I’m sitting across from my ol’ gramps. He’s speaking, reading from his latest volume of memoirs, he says it’s his last and I guess he’s probably the one to know. The writing isn’t overly expressive and it seems more about a setting down of the events, but when he’s reading it, you can see in his head the memories come back, he can remember the wind, that day on the beach -the last, how it blew her hair all over the place, and how they had got lost and at first it was like being a kid again, but then it was cold too and they could see in each others eyes that time was running out. He remembers how even though they were scared they managed to smile at each other and make that moment last. When he puts down the book you can see in his eyes as the memory fades once more and a quiet fills it’s space.

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Came across Theresa Andersson the other day. Very lovely music indeed. Go listen.

Pic up top, Poco blowing bubbles. Also, she started her blog, officially. So check it out.

Now I must go do some work of the lifeguarding variety.]]> Mon, 12 Oct 2009 09:02:15 -0700 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5455557 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5293407 Busy weekend.

Art starting to go a bit smoother now with group seemingly happier about direction. Saying that, I was the only person in the studio on Friday. Need to get up to the library for some heavy paper research.

Friday night watched Annie Hall avec Poco. Will post a review up on Film Collective. I really enjoyed it though. Though it was very funny how Alvy Singer (Woody Allen) is always quoting and reading a range of authors, thinkers, critics etc. who to achieve that image of ‘intellectuality’ it is still important to read today. I enjoy reading that kind of stuff, I just think the image that goes with it is kinda ridiculous.

Saturday was very nice as Poco and I went to see Toy Story 3D which was followed by pie. I remember seeing Toy Story the first time round at the cinema very clearly. We went to see it in Leeds and were very excited and for some reason we parked really far away from the cinema and had a long walk with my dad trying to keep me and my sisters from stepping off the narrow pavement into the road. In 3D it was equally charming, funny and fantastic. Just a big teaser for the third film’s release next year. Pie after the cinema is mine and Poco’s little cinematic moment, appropriating american culture as seen through the hollywood lens. It is very nice though.

Today we perused the European market that was in Leicester. Bought some caramel coated hazelnuts which were/are (there are still a few remaining) very tasty. The whole street smells so great when all the stalls are up. It is like christmas. I also had some kinda German sausage thing which was pretty good. The stall holder seemed impressed by my decision to get the curry one and was very happy to find out I liked it. There was also a stall selling little wooden ornaments and instruments with a very large Indian man sat between two Buddhas of equal girth. We asked him something and for a moment he didn’t answer. Then he realised. He explained that the song playing in the background was a very beautiful piece and he had been lost in it.

After the market it was Poco’s dance show. This takes place twice a year and is quite an experience. Poco is great to watch as she dance real good. The venue however is very bizarre, and there are lots of really bad dances with bad costumes and music to sit through. It takes place on the upper floor of a chain-smoking bingo playing old mans club. It is a very surreal experience and incredibly interesting. I don’t know what will happen when all the old men from downstairs have died. I can’t really see that kind of place surviving once it’s current batch of members have succumbed to lung cancer or hopefully old age.

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There is a photograph I saw recently which I have been thinking about slightly more than all the other million images I have seen since. Link on right. The photo, taken by Robert Wiles in 1974 depicts the body of Evelyn Mchale who had just committed suicide by jumping off the empire state building. Quite incredible and beautiful and sad.

Beautiful is a word that, as far as I can tell, has been shunned by people who write about stuff for a long time. When people say ‘sublime’ they mean ‘beautiful’. Sublime just points out that a) you are clever, and b) you are aware that beautiful is uncool. Anyways, I’ve been looking out for this kind of thing for a while and I am sure that beautiful is on the increase, and that’s nice. I think it had something to do with people writing critically about paintings and finding beautiful to be a tad limiting. But that was hundreds of years ago.

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Pic up top of my sister I. More fun times with wide angle lens from video camera.

Also had several packages this week. First up was the Kodak Zi8. It is really fun to have a new gadget. The camera is pretty great really and will be very useful for just catching shots on the move and trying stuff out. The image quality is really nice and it all functions quite well. Second was my cafepress tee. It is super cool to see my design in the living cotton. Buuuut the neck on the garment is real weird. I plan to cut it off. Solves my problem of whether or not to change to a U.K distributor of tees though. I’m pretty sure I will.

Autumn is autumnal. I love it.]]> Sun, 04 Oct 2009 14:09:01 -0700 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5293407 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5188778 So, two days into Lusad... We are working in groups to begin with which is more challenging than it should be. In groups of nine we are developing our ideas from all the photos of found objects. First day, very tense. Second day, still rather uneasy. Hopefully the break that wednesday brings will give people time to think things over. I think part of the problem is the groups desire to work towards a final piece without any exploration further than what’s already sat in our heads. It would be nice if there could be a more relaxed air in the way we are reaching decisions. I know that we will get into the rhythm of it all and make the most of each others ideas. However I did seem to have This Year by The Mountain Goats on loop. I think that could be my LUSAD anthem. It is all good fun though. I was just having a bad day. -My car broke down as well.

Hopefully spending some time on The Film Collective tomorrow which will be a nice way to focus. It feels more and more like a really necessary group to get organised, like the proles finally get organised. But not so much.

Early start tomorrow, work at half 6. It does mean I get to see the world at a funny time when it can be very beautiful, but often I am just too tired.]]> Tue, 29 Sep 2009 12:42:14 -0700 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5188778 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5079702 So the news....

Turns out Battle Monstere are enjoying some airtime in some cool kids hangout up in aberdeen. They are playing Cinnamon Bear, BATTLE BATTLE and Re Remi in store now! Rumours are, there’s even a fanmade tshirt flying around the highlands. Blimey.

Expect a new battle monstere e.p/full length album around christmas, hopefully!

Lots of film collective action going down, including a new website space. http://www.thefilmcollective.tk admittedly there aint much on there, just a link to the forum and email. However, it exists, it is real and we are picking up members left, right and centre. Lots of work to do there.

I watched Wounded last night. It was a documentary on BBC1 about two soldiers wounded in Afghanistan and their recovery in the uk. The two soldiers were very brave. Watch it on iplayer.

Starting uni tomorrow. Quite exciting. Feels strange as I will still be living at home. Can’t wait to see who is on my course!

also this link is good

http://file051a.bebo.com/19/large/2009/09/23/17/7602213281a11632441342l.jpg

(for all those BM fans!!)

caio.]]> Thu, 24 Sep 2009 06:06:30 -0700 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/5079702 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/4990525 Just spent a while photographing FOUND OBJECTS. Really haven’t got through as much of the reading as I had hoped I would. But just about have my 20 images now and will be getting them printed soon. Tried using the video camera a bit as well to get some stills. The results are very different to the SLR shots.

Poco has dance exam today! Good luck.

Am listening to Daniel Johnston’s Fun. I really like it.

I had started trying to turn my Doldrums film into a something more filmable. It is set just before the bigger idea but plays around with the elements of the characters and the way it works. Currently filmable, just about. It is hard when writing to concentrate on what is possible rather than just write. It forces you to think carefullly about how different sides of the characters are revealed and the use of dialogue, and also the progression of the narrative.



That pic is one of the found objects.]]> Sun, 20 Sep 2009 07:00:08 -0700 http://virb.com/cinemateus/posts/text/4990525