task 2

Understanding the potential of video in an exhibition space as an art form

In this report I shall attempt to understand the potential of video in an exhibition space as an art form. To do this I shall firstly cover what a video installation is then give a brief history of the form. Then I shall analyze two different video installation artists to enable me to answer the main objective of this report. Also, furthering my knowledge will help me make my own installation better.

Video installation started in the 1970s. Video installation is a contemporary art form that combines video technology with installation art, making use of all aspects of the surrounding atmosphere to make an affect the watchers. since the 1970s video installations has been developed more and has now become more popular and used by many people. 

Bruce Nauman

Bruce Nauman is a contemporary American artist, who was born on the 6^th December 1941 in ford Wayne Indiana. He studied in two different universities, The University of Wisconsin and The University of California. He first studied mathematics then art. In 1965 Nauman stopped painting and started to create objects, performance pieces and films. He now lives in New Mexico on his ranch and does a lot of his work there. 

Nauman practices in a variety of different media for example;-

• Sculpture
• Photography
• Neon
• Video
• Drawing
• Printmaking
• Performing

Nauman video work of “lip sync” has been displayed at the Museum of Modern Art. The video lip sync shows nauman saying the words "lip sync" into a camera upside down held in a close-up he repeats the word of the title lip sync into a microphone and hearing it back though head phones and as hearing it through the head phones he is trying to say the words lip sync exactly the way he said it previously at first is sounds quite and low but then gets rapidly heavier and louder. Gradually the video and the sound start to go in and out of sync and really makes the viewer want to put together his lips and his voice. the video is like an endless circle of the words lip sync going on and on being endless. This makes the watcher feel uncomfortable and nervous like they are in some sort of trance and because even though they feel this way they can't seem to keep there eyes off the video and seem to almost cone to be one with the video.        
  

Changing light Corridor with Room 

Nauman has had a number of major solo exhibitions;-

• Dia Art Foundation (2002)
• Deutsche Guggenheim
• Tate Modern (2004)
• Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (2005)
• Tate Liverpool (2006)
• Milwaukee Art Museum (2006)
• Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (2007)
• Hamburger Bahnhof (2010)

His last exhibition in the UK was in (1989)

Nauman work is now at the Harris Museum and Art Gallery display an exhibition of his work, as one of the best inspiring artists of our time. The show includes his epic work, Changing Light Corridor with Rooms.

Silver Livres

Perfect balance 

Make Me Thin

Bruce Naumans' worked is mainly aimed at people who enjoy video installation and for people who like sculptures  and neon work if they like Bruce Naumans work they might also like Anthony Tuners sculptures work and Keith Sonniers neon art work. Nauman doesn't have a specific gender for his work, its mostly just for people who enjoy abstract art. His work is for young adult who are studying art and adults who understand and appreciate art. The aged range for Naumans' work would be 20-50 his work would be for lower middle class people . 

The video "pinch neck" shows nauman pinching his lips and cheek's with his fingers and pulls his neck and lips. the camera is at a close up angel with most of his face cropped off so the actions are hard to see anything below his neck, by having the camera at this angel it makes the audience feel agitated because they want to see the rest of the body and face, also by having his fingers touch and analyse his own face makes the watcher feel  uncomfortable because it's as if he isn't touching his own face but some sort of art object.   

Jennifer Steinkamp 

Jennifer Steinkamp was born in 1958 in Denver Colorado. She is an American installation artist. She is the eldest child of her family out of two brothers and three sisters. As a young adult she moved to Los Angeles to attend Art Center College of Design then later transferred to study experimental animation in California Institute of the Arts. Steinkamp then returned back to Art Center to earn her BFA in 1989. She is currently a professor in the department of Design Media Arts.

Steinkamps work isn’t technically interactive she uses the computer not as a tool to comment on technology, but rather to create imagery.

But her work is still difficult to be put in a category. Steinkamp is being called a video artist a lot of the time even though her work isn't photo or video-based. She is known for her media art and installation videos.

she has shown her work globally in a range of venues and contexts she has been involved in the California Video exhibition at the Getty Museum.

Steinkamp has been in numerous exhibitions and her work is in the permanent public collections of: The Los Angeles County Museum of Art;

• The Denver Art Museum,
• The San Jose Museum of Art
• Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles
• Staples Center
• Henry Art Gallery, Seattle
• Albright-Knox Art Gallery
• The Fremont Street Experience
• The Experience Music Project
• The Corcoran Gallery of Art
• Museum of Contemporary Art
• Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León
• Istanbul Modern
• Progressive Corporation
• Autostadt Collection
• Phoenix Art Museum
• Hammer Museum
• CAC Museum of Malaga, Malaga
• Vero Beach Museum of Art
• The West Collection; Weatherspoon Art Museum

 

This video installation, shows a tree growing which symbolizes in life, by having a tree with radiant colours. It shows the way Steinkamp has a love of life, also by having  the tree with all theses different bright colours instead of natural tree colours, it makes the watcher feel that the tree is fake and this puts the watcher in a dream like state and by having the tree constantly grow and move and seeing new colours appear makes the watcher think that their is more of a symbolical meaning like how life can change and how time can pass so fast.  

Steinkamp has a variety of different audiences for instance university art students aged 19-27 ,other artists, people who enjoy watching art and also fashion designers for example Narciso Rodriguez was inspired by the work of Steinkamp and managed to design a spring dress selling it for $2,700. Both genders enjoy watching Jennifers work because it isn't biased in any way. However also fan of artist Jane Appleby might also like Steinkamps work, because both artist do some similar qaulity's in art for instance they both like to involve a lot of colours with their work of trees.her work is also set for middle class people.   

What I have learnt from writing this report is that different artist use video installations in different ways, and due to this they have different audiences.

Alternative Narratives 

Abstract 

Abstract film is a subgenre of experimental film. Its history often overlaps with the concerns and history of visual music.

Non-narrative abstract films started in the 20s and were popular in the 30s and 40s. Norman McLaren worked closely with this genre; he also did a lot of drawing on film animation, visual music, pixilation and graphic sound. He has inspired musicians, filmmakers and artist like Picasso and Truffaut. McLaren was born on the 11 April 1914 in Scottish and raised in Canadian he is know as an animator and film director recognised for his work for the National Film Board of Canada.  

In a lot of McLaren work like for instance “dots” that was filmed in the 1940s he shows the relationship between sound and image. The film dots is an experimental film of dots animated by painting directly on frames of film, by making the dots connect with the music it really opened a new world to animators and artists, this video showed the watcher that music could also be incorporated with animaton and this changed the way people thought about incorporating music/sound in films.

Surrealism 

Surrealism and fractured narratives started 20s and 30s the people who mostly worked with these genres were Luis Bunuel, Maya Deren and David lynch 


Bunuel was a spanish filmaker who was famous for his surreal approach whilst attending the univerity of madrid he met Salvador Dalf and Federico Garcia Lorca who both infulenced his art. he later on moved to france and worked as an assistant director to jean epstein. the first ever film he made was "un chien andalou" he created this in 1928 

In the film "Un Chien Andalou" the chronology is disjointed skipping from "Once Upon a time" to "eight years later" in the time scale not much has changed. This video by Bunel is very dream like  


Mayar Deren came to America with her father a psychiatrist and her mother an artist; she joined her interests in dance and "subjective psychology" in a series of surreal short film in white and black
  
Using editing, multiple exposures, jump cutting, superimposition, slow-motion and other camera techniques to her fullest advantage, Deren creates continued motion through discontinued space, while abandoning the established notions of physical space and time, with the ability to turn her vision into a stream of consciousness.

In the video "at land" was made in 1944 this video is a silent film, "Deren once said that the film is about the struggle to maintain one's personal identity".

Non- linear

Slumdog Millionaires the perfect example of non-narrative films. Slumdog million starts from the ending showing a boy on the TV show "who wants to be a millionaire" about to answer the last winning question, but he arrested under the suspicion of cheating so police integrate him and under interrogation his story’s of his life unravel though flash backs exampling how he new the answers to most questions. Thought his flash backs also show the lives of his brother and girlfriend. The film shows 3 different stories going on at the same time, and how the people are connected in away that allows him to know the answers to the question.

 
 

This film is partly a non-linear film the narrative device Danny Boyle uses flash backs in a lot of his films like "train spotting" and "127 hours" to show the past and why they do things. Danny Boyle heavily uses flash back in his films because he knows how important the non-linear element is to have conventual flash backs to help the audience to understand a character and feel like they have a Understanding of why the character does things and in this case "Jamal" and how he knows the answer to the game show. Now are days audiences are sophisticated enough to know when a flash back has occurred because now flash backs have become a natural thing to see in films.