Author Archives: michael

Dave Milner – Redmires to Hillsborough and Back

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Redmires to Hillsborough and Back (2008, 274MB 21:09 min)

I love this piece, partly for sentimental reasons in that it
features the town (and in fact at two points the street)
of my birth and upbringing, but it’s not simply that.
I like the formal device upon which Dave Milner hangs this austere
& accurate portrait of a greyish October Sheffield.

Austere, but not without warmth or humour: Milner’s tussle with his SatNav,
his under the breath impatience at the traffic & the various other small
en-route mishaps lend a three dimensionality and a narrative forward
motion to what could be easily have been either a dry exercise or simply
a bit of ,for want of a better word, internet folk art…

Milner’s site, with both contemporary and (slightly) historical photos
of Sheffield and other places is compelling too.
Again, I plead guilty to a personal interest in the places times and
themes but it’s the thoroughness devoted to an evocation of place
and time that is both effective and moving.

Bruce Conkle

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Bruce Conkle (2009, 243MB, 5:32 min)

A very deftly made & absorbing documentary directed by Robert D’Esposito &
shot by Kevin Forrest about the excellent Portland, OR based artist Bruce Conkle.
It’s a bit of a download but worth it both as a nifty bit of filmmaking
(and everything is good – listen to that crystal clear sound!)
but also because Bruce’s work is great.
There’s a big fat HD version on the Vimeo link above ..

We’re leaving you with something chunky to contemplate
as we’re going to take a summer break now.
We’ll be back on September 14th (unless anything so
wonderful & time limited appears we just have to put our
Daiquiris down, shuffle into the house & post it…)
Have a good summer!

More Eddie Whelan

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Gold Medal Match (2009, 89MB 2:48 min)

Original editorial…

Two tiny Sporkworld loops

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A Small Spork Lumiere (2009, 3MB, 9 sec silent loop)


Fireworks (2009, 2MB, 43 sec silent loop)

Two from the ever reliable, delightful, and in its quiet & unassuming
(but frequently deadly – it’s the Columbo of art blogs) way, mould-breaking
Sporkworld Microblog, which if you don’t follow religiously, you should.
Ironically, given the setting, A Small Spork Lumiere could constitute a kind
of ostensive definition of dryness.

Laurie Johnson – Bleak House

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Bleak House (2009, 23MB, 1:34)

Assured & atmospheric piece from Laurie Johnson.
Interesting to compare it with previous work.
There’s a distinct sense of consolidation, of raising the game,
going on here.
One to watch.

Processing

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Processing1
Flight Patterns (2005, 22.9MB, 1:48 min.)

Processing2
A String (2005, 43.5.9MB, 3:49 min.)

Documentation of two projects using the open source processing language.
A String was made by E.J.Gone for a performance at the National Theater
of Korea & Flight Patterns involves flight pattern visualizations from FAA
data parsed and plotted in ‘Processing’ by Aaron Koblin.
Fascinating & austerely beautiful.

More School of Athens – Eddie Whelan’s James Burke

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James Burke (2009, 168MB 5:53 min)

There’s something -I don’t know –insouciant about these School of Athens folks.
That’s one of the definite links, a kind of throw away, thrown together quality, that teases
because I’d be equally unsurprised to learn that every second was laboured over mightily.
(Think not though, but of course that’s not a criticism. )
Of course the styles of the various “members” differ somewhat too.
Eddie Whelan seems to specialise in a rather garish but fetching pop surrealism.
I like the somewhat in your face and worn at the edges motion graphics as much
as I find genuinely evocative the appropriated beach (eclipse?) footage.
Also, what’s not to like about a movie featuring a minor BBC cult
science reporter of the 80s…
Whelan’s idosyncratic way with spelling engages rather than irritates
which for me at least is a bit of an acid test.
Good.
More from Eddie the Wheel in the next days and weeks.

More Strangeness from Joan Healy

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Creak (2008, 45MB 10:54 min)


Beautiful Katamari Royal Rainbow (2008, 17MB 5:08 min)

Mad as a box of badgers but also very smart & winning, Joan Healy is a one-off.
We’ve featured her before, here’re some new vids of her work.
Even more here…

I Can’t Deal With This Stupid Ringing Forever – Donna Kuhn

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I Can’t Deal With This Stupid Ringing Forever (2009, 56MB 2:29 min)

Donna Kuhn has joined the little pantheon (Sondheim’s another, as is Sam Renseiw)
of people whose work I’m just going
to post regularly because they are great.
No apology, no argument.
If you can’t see it, the problem is yours.
Great. Great. Great.

Lin Delpierre – Austere Beauty

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Autoportrait d’Oro (2009, 63MB, 11:04 min)

There’s so much to commend in this quiet & beautiful piece I’m
unsure, really, where to start.
Three things though, stand out.
One is the modesty, the restraint, of the conception
-there’s no horrible look-at-how clever/shocking/whatever I am
about it, just some serious *looking*.
The camera looks and we look with it, with its (and with the artist’s,
although he’s there in the frame too) help.
Second, this austerity of visual means allows the sound to play a really
significant role in the piece. Again the work doesn’t trumpet its own innovative
qualities but quietly (pun intended) it does something quite radical with sound and
with our attention to same.
Lastly, it’s just very, very well made – that sort of still amibience is just so difficult to capture
effectively because digital video can be very unforgiving in that context – interlacing
& pretty much any sort of compression can generate horribly visible artefects.
Here, even in this pretty compressed version, there are none -it just looks like a
transparent window to a small epiphany…
Hats off then, three times.

Lin Delpierre’s site.