The Good Consumer (2008, 18.2MB, 5:27)
In honor of , a satirical video about
being a good consumer. BND falls on Nov. 28 in North
America, but everyone else “celebrates” on Nov. 29.
So this whether this video is right on time for you or
a day early, we’re still pretty sure you will appreciate
the message.
Made by Neil Boorman from Bonfire of the Brands.
MyStyle (2008, 73MB, 3:40 min.)
Michael C. Place promotes “MyStyle” for Pritt in France in 2008.
Michael is founder of BUILD.
Tim and Puma Mimi: High Five Low Five (2012, 283MB, 4:22 min)
Slightly self-consciously kooky but, it must be said, splendidly
entertaining bit of both music and moving image, from -ahem –
Tim and Puma Mimi.
Curiously we were lobbied for this by a publicist type fellow.
We’re quite flattered here at DVblog that we’re thought of as having
any clout.
I should say we turned down the first couple of things he suggested
and he obviously then did his homework because this one we like, a lot.
One Step Ahead – Stefan Nadelman (2004, 9MB, 4:07)
Stefan Nadelman is Tourist Pictures, and since I like
his older stuff just as much (or more than) the new,
I’m posting this Nike-commissioned piece from a few years ago.
Saved By The Bell/Mofones (2011, 33MB, 54 secs)
The title of this post being words that seldom pass my lips but which in this case
are entirely to the point.
The splendidly creative video artist Morrisa Maltz whose work we’ve been delighted
to feature here several times made these..um..arty-i-phone holders, which are, it has
to be said, rather good and to cut a long story short their commercial potential was
spotted and now she is a C….E….O & Urban Outfitters are selling her stuff.
You can read a fuller account here and you can view & buy here.
I hope she spends all of any money she makes on giving herself time to make more of the
very smart and fetching art videos she’s so good at.
Anyway this is a promotional vid for the moFones, lovingly carved from “Saved by the Bell”.
She even does marketing classily.
The Incorporation of Demands for Liberation(2011, 13MB, 3:24 min)
Brilliant!
Last piece from ANW, for the moment, although we
certainly hope to feature more in the future –
some of the most original and exciting work I’ve seen recently.
For some context see Monday’s post.
Flow Spot Test #6 (2011, 18MB, 3:34 min)
“Just downloading apps at my Blanc Laptop Cart when all
of a sudden BenJi, an old teammate from XpresSpa shows up.
He happens to be subcontracted now by the American Airlines
subsidiary AffinityAlliance as an evaluator of potential for their
Oneworld Alliance codeshare lounges (of which FlowSpot is the
newest member).”
Flow Spot Test #5 (2011, 57MB, 2:03 min)
“Just having my early afternoon session of Body-Work with
Nnah, my Body-Designer.”
Says ANW, of the FlowSpot Tests:
For a large-scale exhibition at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago
I created a color coordinated airport/hotel/mall/bank/spa/biennial lounge to
offer a site of relaxation and bodily engagement in an exhibition dominated
by isolated, sellable art objects.
All lounge products were purchased through online transactions (mostly
Target and Walmart), and were returned at the end of the exhibition.
My dystopic science fiction news video Global Countdown played on
a 55” flat panel monitor.
On opening night, visitors to FlowSpot could register for massages from
licensed massage therapists. While participants received massages they
could not see anything and listened to my directors commentary of the
Global Countdown video. The commentary consists of very basic visual
descriptions, with the goal being that the person receiving the massage
can visualize the video in their minds.
Throughout the duration of the exhibition, I used the lounge as a science
fiction video set to make “FlowSpot Tests.” In these videos I engaged
with the lounge both conceptually and materially in a color coordinated
outfit.
Contact me if you are interested in opening a FlowSpot in your airport,
hotel, mall, bank, spa, biennial, gallery, cultural center, or any other
space that you own/lease/use.
See also.
Anxiety About Relationships Between Friendship and Business (2011, 11MB, 2:41 min)
I’m so taken with Andrew Norman Wilson’s work I’m going to devote
the whole first week of this DVblog season to it.
He initially sent us a longish piece, Networking with Andrew Norman Wilson
made with Nicholas O’Brien of Bad At Sports.
It’s wonderful but pretty huge so you should definitely go and
look at the Vimeo version there.
On Monday, Weds and Friday of this week we’ll post smaller
pieces extracted from that (but without the commentary or
‘interview’ as it is styled elsewhere [-the text on the BAS page linked above]) ,
On Tuesday and Thursday we’ll post two of Wilson’s FlowSpot Tests
with some accompanying explanation from him.
I find this work in general very exciting because it does a lot
of interesting, nuanced and often rather funny (and I’m in favour of funny –
there are very few great works of art which contain no funny at all)
and intially apparently contradictory things.
Let me give you my take on it.
The Webinars are all composed entirely of footage sourced from Pond5
“the worlds stock media marketplace” . The FlowSpot Tests are performative
pieces involving bizarre consumer items sourced from e-bay and wallmart and
deployed in a 21st Century updating of silent movie Lloyd-Keaton-Chaplin
deadpan involving, too, a certain degree of slapstick
and displaying a deliciously calibrated sense of the ridiculous.
The Webinars (a least when one takes account of their titles and certainly viewed
in the light of the commentary from “networking”) are a kind of consumerist
reductio-ad-absurdam.
The intent is celarly in some sense satirical but the pieces take risks in
that they don’t stop and end in critique – there is an understanding of
how toxically compelling some of this imagery is and to some extent they
toy with celebrating this.
Wilson is clearly a natural movie maker. He doesn’t restrain himself from
visual flourishes and jokes which are by no means integral to any
satirical case but make the pieces more fun to watch.
(The distortion effects applied to objects in the periphery of the
action in FlowSpot Test #5 are a case in point.)
Additionally, and most impressively, there is a muddying of the
waters in Networking… (and by implication the
Webinars and FlowSpot Tests) whereby
cogent and apparently straightforward philosophising is allowed
to cross pollinate/contaminate with the satire and vice versa,
leaving the viewer with -ahem- work to do.
This work is not glib; it takes risks – in order to maintain its
high level potency it risks misunderstanding.
A look at Wilson’s CV shows a spell spent working for a
labour union and I read the impulse behind these pieces
as radically anti-commodification and corporate mind rot.
Agit-prop, thankfully, it’s not, but “something rich and strange”
– radical art for interesting times to come.
Nice to see this when so many younger artists seem to be
tempted by a career orientated and somewhat cynical celebration
of that same deadend emptiness.
Layers (2007, 23 MB, 5:23 min)
“Layers is a mashup narrative machinima created with footage from Metal
Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (PS2), Military footage from an Apache Helicopter
in Iraq (Public Domain/Department of Defense), and Shadow of the Colossus
(PS2). Recorded almost entirely through a sniper scope from the game, it
extends the conversation about the relationship between increasingly
sophisticated military technology and the drive towards visual realism in
videogames. What happens to the relationship between killer and victim
when they are separated by real and virtual distances? Adding the layer
of virtuality through the videogame complicates this relationship even further.”
by Joshua Fishburn.
MoFone commercial (2011, 8MB, 1:31 min)
First of two pieces this week from the very talented Morrisa Maltz,
this one is a commercial for some kind of art-phone venture she seems
to be involved in.
Whilst I might pass on the product, I’m stuck dumb by the glorious
verve and insouciance of the ad.
It’s interesting – her personal work is very identifiable ( in a good way, I
hasten to add, and, as you’ll see later this week it moves onwards).
This is utterly different but also a really really neat bit of film-making,
suggesting deep reserves of skill and smarts as well as vision.
Blackball (2008, 10MB, 1:21 min)
God, I dislike this work! It’s the combination of the stellar
degree of smug self-congratulation with a faux experimentalism/pretension
to art similarly typified by the ludricous “creative” moniker
attached to exponents of advertising.
But..but..again – like some ads, not many, some – there’s
something to be learned here, especially from Beasting
which manages to be both deeply, Zoolanderishly, risible
(the branded underpants) but also generate a kind of deep,
myth-related frisson.
All the more vexing that somewhere here is real talent.
So…we hold our noses and post…
Enough! Six months, at least, before any more of this.
I’m going out for some air.
Readings (2008, 43 MB, 9:53 min.)
I must admit I’d never really heard of fashion video as a genre
until someone I teach showed me an astonishing piece by
Ruth Hogben & Gareth Pugh last week, which sent me off in search of more.
This piece comes from site called ShowStudio:
‘an award-winning fashion website, founded and directed by Nick Knight,
that has consistently pushed the boundaries of communicating fashion online.’
according to its ‘about’ page.
The piece we’re posting here is directed by Knight together with the designer
Hussein Chalayan, with editing by Ruth Hogben and music by Anthony, of Johnsons
fame.
It’s a tour de force, fizzing with ideas, a mesmerising watch,
and a fund of stealable ideas, so we’ll definitely be returning
for more, though I have to say I only see a dark void where
a living heart might have beat – there’s no speck of warmth
or humanity to it.
DeResFX.Kill(KarmaPhysics < Elvis); (2004, 6.8 MB, 1:54 min.)
“A modification of the bloody science fiction first person
shooter computer game Unreal 2003.”
By Brody Condon.
![16 [R]EVOLUTIONS](http://dvblog.org/wp-content/images/16revs.jpg)
16 [R]EVOLUTIONS (2006, 3MB, 1:50 min)
I saw this piece from NY based group Troika Ranch a few years back
in deepest Essex, UK & it was utterly great –
took me about ten minutes to put my jaw back in postion after.
Certainly by far the most convincing & mature use of digital
technology/projection in a dance context I had then seen.
Much of the visual flavour comes from the Isadora real time video
manipulation software created by co-artistic director Mark Coniglio &
used together with motion sensing software.
It’s not just the tech stuff though – it’s great choreography & dance
somehow informed by the particular rhythms, logic, that the tech
feedback loop sets up, implies.
It’s the fact, too, that a company deploying cutting edge tech can
still use simple shadow & stillness to devastating effect.
“Move” (2009, 25MB, 3:06 min.)
Mims – “Move”, a hip-hop music video that used high-speed Phantom
cameras to shoot the “ultra slow-motion” dance/movement sequences.
By Keith Schofield.
“Heaven Can Wait” (2009, 21MB, 2:40 min.)
Charlotte Gainsbourg & Beck music video by Keith Schofield.
Skateboard on Cheeseburgers and Floating Cloth shots inspired
by the work of William Hundley.
Couldn’t figure out if this commercial is a spoof or for real.
Commerce meets art. Maybe.
Actually if you wear the shoes you can really do all that.
No..er..really.
From DC shoe.
Wal-Mart (2005, 9.4 MB, 2:48 min)
Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price was the documentary film sensation
that’s changing the largest company on earth. The film features the
deeply personal stories and everyday lives of families and communities
struggling to survive in a Wal-Mart world.
It’s an emotional journey that will challenge the way you think, feel.. and shop.
Directed by Robert Greenwald.
Superflex – Flooded McDonald’s (2009, 8.2MB, 0:41)
Clip from a twenty minute video of a McDonald’s
being fully submerged underwater. (Don’t worry –
they recycled the water, and no staff was present.)
What do you think it means? Is it a statement about
collective inability to act, climate change and multinational
corporations, or consumption?
Whatever the intentions, the video is oddly calming.
From Danish video collective Superflex.
Uffe Ellemann-Jensen in Tokyo – (2008, 5.1MB, 1:18)
Bear with me here: have you ever felt lost? I don’t
mean existentially. I mean alone in a place that was
not your own, a foreigner in a strange land, a stranger
in a foreign land. I have on several occasions – including
during a solo trip to Japan a few years ago – and when
this commercial came on my TV about a month back, I
couldn’t tear myself away. No, it isn’t net art or experimental
animation, but it’s beautiful and haunting and something I
certainly see far too little of on television. If you think a little
Lost in Translation, you wouldn’t be wrong for that. The guys
behind the this piece admitted in a recent interview that they
paid special attention to reproducing LiT details for fans of the film.
Other facts: this is a commercial for SAS featuring former
Danish Secretary of State, and two more similar follow-ups
are running/forthcoming (though not featuring Ellemann-Jensen or Japan,
sadly). The startlingly mournful music is appropriately from Babel.
The tagline reads, in English, “Almost home” or “As good as home.”
Sneaux Shoes launched a consumer-generated video campaign
with a stop-motion video of a human skateboard. The TV ad
features a skateboarder using a kid as a skateboard and performing
classic tricks like ollies, grinds and 360s.
PES who directed the video made it entirely in-camera (Canon D20)
and on location through the use of a stop-motion animation technique
known as pixilation. Says PES: “This spot is a great example of the
breadth of stop-motion. If something exists in the real world, it can be animated.”
Editing and sound design was done by Sam Welch at Homestead, New York.
Skye Bender-deMoll – Organic Brand Ownership Networks (2007, 9MB, 0:18)
We love moving charts and maps, in case you couldn’t tell.
This one, from Skye Bender-deMoll, features organic food brands
circa late 2007, and their often overlooked connections.
The yellow nodes are food processors, blue are investment firms,
green are organic brands, and red are new organic brand introductions.
via Another Limited Rebellion
Get Out and Play (2008, 36.9MB, 1:25 min)
Somebody called Donna sends us a mail ‘writing from a Nokia sponsored blog’.
Donna, kind soul that she is, thought
‘With your stop motion background we thought you might have a
different take on the video than the gamers and
tech bloggers who might normally watch the video’
Aw..bless her!
Nothing to do, then, with trying to use as us a part of an attempted
“virality” strategy ( don’t get us wrong, we’re impressed dvblog even
appears on these folks’ radar)
So..watch the movie..it’s good.
There’s stuff to be learned here, no doubt –
not least that the corporate vultures can clearly buy in time and talent;
but how much better a world it would be if the silly amounts of cash it
clearly cost to make this just went straight to fund new work by artists…
Toby Segaran – WalMart Growth (2008, 6.6MB, 0:46)
Toby Segaran isn’t a media artist – he’s actually
a software developer and writer. But, he made
this excellent video clip of American WalMart growth
from 1962 to the present on his off time at work,
and the way I see it, the best work sometimes
happens when you, well, aren’t working. Similar
to these videos made with the processing language.
Papa and Daddy – Jump Start (2008, 9.8MB, 0:53)
Papa and Daddy (Shawn Preston and Ross Ludwig)
made this terrific 2008 Superbowl commercial,
a fun coincidence since I found their charming ad
work via Food Chain Films, a nice page of several
directors based in Portland.
