ELDON BOOTH

Eldon Booths film work has used many different filming techniques to portray reality - or 'an illusion of reality'.

In one film 'Withdrawal', He use 'amateur' techniques he calls them, to portray an effect that seems it is being filmed in real life. Such as abrubd panning, making it feel like the camera man was part of the scene, e.g. home video.
There was the jerkiness of this handheld camera of 'worst quality'(Eldon Booth) being used that created the feel of adreneline, with the focus being often blurred, creating this action that wasnt settling. By doing this it created an effect that the camera man didn't know what was happening next, thus an illusion of reality.

He also uses juxtaposistioning of the two contrasting screens next to each other, this creates conflict between the sons life style and the grandads dying lifestyle, e.g. medical drugs for the grandad vs. by lifestyle drugs for the grandson.
This also creates dysfunction and shows the 'old' being replaced with the new, old houses being removed for new subdivison etc…(also in areas tha we as new zealanders are recognizeable with)
These shots have no definied beginning or end, seeming like a continous link to the shot but alsways having a change of clothes or location etc, going for this to emphaisiase 'grandads' detoriation, instead of chronolgical death…

Another movie that features Justaposistion is Gus Van Sants 'Elephant'. Howevere, this movie uses a very different type of juxtaposistion, He does this by jumping back in forth in time, and going through the same 'scene' but through a different characters point of view... This shows multiple levels of time unfolding, which creates confusion for the viewer but in the end everything interconnects. This way we get to know each 'character'. The director allows us to see from multuiple view point simultenously.

Eldon Booth uses majorly also counter view shots. This pulls us as the viewer into the film like we are following the character, or watching in. In doing so, creating reality or the lillusion it. I really found funny how Eldon Booth in Withdrawal used these 'amateur' video techniques. He explained that he was heavily inspired by reality tv at the time. Since the filming of Withdrawal, technology has had a major make over, now with youtube and video cell phones this kind of filming a lot more 'mainstream', maybe. In the late 1990s we were bombarded with real life reality shows such as worlds worst crimanals, and other similas (police ten seven etc)...

One of the reality t.v. shows that Booth was really influenced was the "E.R Ambush". A live show they did, typified by 'hand held jerkiness'.


I also really enjoyed the second film of Booth's we watched.It was a lot more dialogue based witch I found a lot more interesting as a viewer.

DION HITCHINGS

Interaction and cultural/ historical aspects and discuss how they relate to Dion Hitchings’ Work:


Dion Hitchings has a very unique way of making art. I will be discussing cultural and interaction aspects of His works.
One of the first points that Hitchings made about his artwork that stoodout to me was “What is my artwork without my audience?” and “Can my art be fully a piece of art without my audience?” -
this was something very cruicial, as interaction has been a big part of the works He has done.

The first work I found very interesting was “Te wao nui a tane”: This work had very strong historical aspects, and was also very interesting in the way it relates to the audience.




This work was part of the pivotal period of Dion’s life, that strated to ‘frame his art career’. Hitching stated this was the first point were he took on the idea of interaction. This is interesting because as the viewer, we look at a ‘pile of sticks’ like this and by no means expect anything to happen.
When the viewer walks into (he places them in a doorway) this art space a trigger is censored which is in the middle of the roof, which creates these to turn at 1rpm (very slowly) and a ‘funny noise’ is created, kind of scaring the viewer. They are very confronting to the viewer as they are bigger than the human body.

There is very much cultural inspiration behind the use of ‘weeping willow’ as the materials. Back when New Zealand was colonized the Maori would move pegs that the ‘farmers’ used to make their territory. Because of this the farmers (from England or wherever) decided to bring these (non-native) trees into NZ and plant them along their boundaries so they could not be moved by the Maori’s. These trees grew like weeds, soaking up the waterways and becoming ecological hazards. Hitchings’ was playing on a bit of a pun for the Maori with this idea. He was also interested in having the idea of ecology, a pun for Maori, “god of the forest, can the god of the forest be the god of a colonized tree?”

Hitching states that ‘art exists in a continuum’- briefly going over the modernism movement and stating that ‘post modernism is influenced by modernist art’ and it also questions modernism. That looking back on history we can pick things out of it that we enjoy and ‘pull them out for our practise’. This aspect is also a big part of his work, being part of the ‘post-modernist’ era has benefitted Him, he says, being ‘half Chinese and half Maori’, his practice suits post-modernism because He draws on all these things, the ‘minority voices’ and dis-empowers the ‘modernist movement’.

Another interesting art work was the work in the Auckland Art gallery in 1999 – this work was positioned in the window, sitting on the ‘outside of art gallery’. It was interesting for interaction as the ‘viewer’ didn’t have to even enter the gallery to engage with it. “it was positioned ‘between spaces’ – between the inside and outside that is.
Space between the inside and the outside… In this project he worked with a friend Lylod Brown, who placed the motion sensor on the outside of the window , and when the viewer walked infront of it , it triggered something and cause smoke to come up, and lights to come on and change, this would create a bit of a fright in the viewer, which is a really cool part of the ‘viewing experience’ as for every viewer the ‘interaction’ would be completely unique.



Another interesting work is the work at Civic square in Manukau, this is based on idea of the mountain in Tahiti, which is a sacred mountain. He states when we ‘colonize a space, you bring with it your memories’. This was culturally unique to the space it is in because he drew on the fact that, the largest numbers of Polynesian people live in Manukau. He used granite rocks from Asia, which relates to his ‘audience’ also the polualation of asians is growing, so could make them ‘feel at home’ and bring memories from home.

Another point I liked that Hitchings’ made was that he is only able to do all these works because of how he communicates with the people he works with. He has many friends that help him out e.g, spray painters, welders, engineers etc.
I really enjoyed learning about the depth both culturally and historically, and also the way Hitchings’ work intereacts with the viewer.

THE ABSURD -

I found this really strange at the beginning, after seeing her work without hearing her speak...

I am not the biggest fan of photography, maybe because I don't understand it so well..

well here goes my attempt:

Rebecca Hobbs presents 'humour' through absurdity which is found in the everyday live..

Coming from the outback in australia she had some works which were made there... One that I liked, was a man falling down onto an airbed in the middle of a desert, which is very absurd!

She explains that she has found and dug up absurdity in ready made situations: And I suppose for every viewer a different level exists at which that work triggers humour...

The other point she made was bringing out the absurdity in getting pleasure from constant striving to find meaning - so she strives to put humour in her work...she also talked of how 'we' set these standards for ourselves that we seem to constantly fail to meet (in striving for these standards)...

Hobbs explained that absurd humour is between ironic humour and on the otherside is slapstick humour...

Peter Shand in his essay 'walking backwards for christmas' states "I think it pertinent, then, that Hobbs’ work is devoid of irony, that it’s consciously generous and sincere. It’s part of how irony operates that it requires an assumed position of privilege in order to get the joke. For her, that reflects on the habit of some modes of practice to require understanding of structural codes in order for the work to be made or responded to."

She shows a light-hearted attitude towards sex 'that reflects back at us our own peccadilloes or repressions' (Peter Shand), this is shown in her work, Adam looks up Jennifer's skirt, which is clearly set up: it is very absurd, and I think is maybe dissing the morality of society.

My favourite work was 'Tethered Horse', The composistion was really effective, which is a 'frontal' shot, and she uses darkness very effectively, which even this feature in itself I think creates absurd 'humour', as it would be fully not normal for a horse to be tied up to a tree in the middle of the night, but hey, maybe it's just one of those things you see in the middle of a desert?

who I thought will win the Walters prize: Fiona Connors: Because I found her work the most intriguing and unique, to be honest, I was really confused by it and couldn't figure out if it was her art work or not, so puzzling :)