Marta: Difference between revisions

Latest revision as of 16:09, 26 January 2017

Video Home System

The writing machine:

I introduce a character that is going to speak for me. The person who is narrating is the one that holds the camera, films and comments on the footage at the same time. The way she tells stories is inspired by a particular language developed by means of VHS cameras. Mundane notes on surrounding environment, daily rituals, family, friends, birthday parties, first communions, holiday in Italy, zoo. A revolutionary device that allowed everyone depict their surrounding for the first time, deprived from the sentimental vibe that 8 mm cameras had had.

Image 2:

We are at the entrance to the city, I zoom in so you can see better. It’s dark, yet can you get a glimpse of the tower? There are two twin towers on both sides of the shore, they are slightly bended towards each other and between them there’s a passage for ships. They greet coming ships with majesty. The image is wobbly, it’s because there are buses, bikes and pedestrians passing behind me and they make the bridge vibrate. And this is a hanging bridge, as most of them in the city. Every time the bus passes, the camera is out of control. So even if I had a tripod it wouldn’t help really.

Image 8:

What does the green light say? Jonas showed us the light house with green lights in Kiel. It was far outside the city at the point where open see begins. So I guess it is supposed to warn ships that the water gets shallow and the passages narrow.

Image 5: I must have overestimated the potential of this camera. Although I got it from my grandpa who is a techno gig it doesn’t really cope with the darkness. Basically you can’t see anything but for blackness. But I remember there is a long cargo ship coming in my direction, I thought strong sidelights on the deck might have been visible on the footage but apparently they are not. And there is also dense thick fog that doesn’t allow me to see the other side of the river. There is a lot of moist in the air in this city. With the temperature around 0, it makes your eyes feel cold. Do you know that feeling? It is quite refreshing and make you wake up but slightly hurt your eyes at the same time. As if the glasslike coat of your eyes was hit by the ground frost. Or, say, when you’re about to cry but try to withhold it and tears accumulate on the surface of your eyes. Oh, and the sound. The sound helps me remember, waves crushing against the concrete shore. So yes, I am on the tip of the island potentially having view on both: the southern and the northern sides of the city. But that’s just a mere speculation.

Image 1: I see her lie, bent over in the shape of a baby in mothers bump. Even though she’s tired she never goes to sleep just like this. She is always prolonging the moment of stepping back as if the day was not enough. It is never enough, and in the nighttime more things are likely to happen and time goes slow. Nobody watches, nobody checks in, the time is less precious. She started to watch a movie by Chantal Akerman but fell asleep very soon after couple of minutes. It is this sweet feeling of falling nothingness, not wanting to wake up neither to undress and allow herself have a proper sleep. Her sleep was very deep until she awakens in confusion in front of the main character lying on the bed in exactly same pose as she was.

Image 9: From a bird sight view the harbor resembles an angular, multi-fingered, outstretched hand. Shapes stretch in different directions. I choose the index finger and head toward its tip. Today is day off and everything stayed in stillness. The cranes in half way, heavy ships slightly lifted on steel constructions, only few solitary fishermen sit by the water gazing out to the other side of the river. I don’t believe they sit there so as not to miss the right time when the fishes come. There are large amounts of chemicals and heavy metals sinking in harbor waters, and mountains of pesticides and other toxic substances. I was surprised when Jonas told me that they used to jump from these industrial bridges on hot summer nights when no one could see. He said it was so high that one had to be cautious when jumping to hit the water surface first with feet, with a straight pose. Once, hitting the surface with an open mouth, he clashed his upper teeth against the lower badly. Maybe it was the last time he jumped.

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-Previously I used writing assemble and edit found material, for example family archives. I made a book in collaboration with my grandmother that consists of her letters (accounts from her exile during the second World War). The book still needs to be redefined and designed in order to find a visually relevant form for the content. A large part of work was typing original letters on computer. Translation of writing from the original materials – just by reiterating one version of another is an act of translation. Apart from text there’s little visual materials: a map, three portraits of my great grandfather, a painting (made by myself on the basis of the descriptions of landscapes) and images of original letters.
+Video Home System
-Currently I am collecting notes, stories, observation, dreams that is in parallel to making spontaneous footage: hoping that might one day serve as a basis for future scripts. It is mostly linked to topics like dislocation, transition, moving in and out, acts of orientation – that is why I chose the harbor to metaphorically encompass the stories. I want to include those little pieces of writing in my art practice. I want to use sound, narrative and image and make assemblages comprising those three. I am interested in the structure of narrative itself, interplay between documentary and narrative. (One of the key literary references would be W.G. Sebald, who is a master in playing between the fictional and the documentary.) I am interested in history and memory – how the subjective, the emotional and historical can be translated into something the viewer can relate to.
+The writing machine:
-I hated writing, didn’t feel it was my tool and still don’t. I would like to find my own way of writing (not academic, not poetry, not conceptual but something in between). My current ambition is to be more courageous, to take it slowly and also differentiate between description and naming (trying better to go beyond describing). I want to make a semi-fictional book and the writing event will be good moment to reveal the content. It is based on my experience, on a journey I undertook in order to meet an artist Paweł Kruk (with an immaterial practice – he re-enacts others artists works, aims to be as little original as possible, travels a lot, traces others artists paths, evokes their ghosts by quasi spiritual rituals, conceives shows consisting of others people works without them knowing ecc). I arranged to meet him in Poznań I got a train but the train was 5 hours late, and he had to leave to Warsaw, I talked to the staff of the train I was in (Szczecin-Poznań) and convinced the staff to call Poznań and delay the train Poznań-Warsaw. So I met the artist on the train and we had 3 hours. Mishups continued and I wanted to record it but the recorder broke. I made notes and made text (which has the form of an interview) which is more of a written dialogue and serves as a base for the book.
+I introduce a character that is going to speak for me. The person who is narrating is the one that holds the camera, films and comments on the footage at the same time. The way she tells stories is inspired by a particular language developed by means of VHS cameras. Mundane notes on surrounding environment, daily rituals, family, friends, birthday parties, first communions, holiday in Italy, zoo. A revolutionary device that allowed everyone depict their surrounding for the first time, deprived from the sentimental vibe that 8 mm cameras had had.
-The book will have visual elements and a materiality of its own.
-It will be in bi-lingual and I would like to acknowledge the act of translation in the book.
+Image 2:
+We are at the entrance to the city, I zoom in so you can see better. It’s dark, yet can you get a glimpse of the tower? There are two twin towers on both sides of the shore, they are slightly bended towards each other and between them there’s a passage for ships. They greet coming ships with majesty.
+The image is wobbly, it’s because there are buses, bikes and pedestrians passing behind me and they make the bridge vibrate. And this is a hanging bridge, as most of them in the city. Every time the bus passes, the camera is out of control. So even if I had a tripod it wouldn’t help really.
+Image 8:
+What does the green light say? Jonas showed us the light house with green lights in Kiel. It was far outside the city at the point where open see begins. So I guess it is supposed to warn ships that the water gets shallow and the passages narrow.
+Image 5:
+I must have overestimated the potential of this camera. Although I got it from my grandpa who is a techno gig it doesn’t really cope with the darkness. Basically you can’t see anything but for blackness. But I remember there is a long cargo ship coming in my direction, I thought strong sidelights on the deck might have been visible on the footage but apparently they are not. And there is also dense thick fog that doesn’t allow me to see the other side of the river. There is a lot of moist in the air in this city. With the temperature around 0, it makes your eyes feel cold. Do you know that feeling? It is quite refreshing and make you wake up but slightly hurt your eyes at the same time. As if the glasslike coat of your eyes was hit by the ground frost. Or, say, when you’re about to cry but try to withhold it and tears accumulate on the surface of your eyes.
+Oh, and the sound. The sound helps me remember, waves crushing against the concrete shore. So yes, I am on the tip of the island potentially having view on both: the southern and the northern sides of the city.
+But that’s just a mere speculation.
+Image 1:
+I see her lie, bent over in the shape of a baby in mothers bump. Even though she’s tired she never goes to sleep just like this. She is always prolonging the moment of stepping back as if the day was not enough. It is never enough, and in the nighttime more things are likely to happen and time goes slow. Nobody watches, nobody checks in, the time is less precious. She started to watch a movie by Chantal Akerman but fell asleep very soon after couple of minutes. It is this sweet feeling of falling nothingness, not wanting to wake up neither to undress and allow herself have a proper sleep. Her sleep was very deep until she awakens in confusion in front of the main character lying on the bed in exactly same pose as she was.
+Image 9:
+From a bird sight view the harbor resembles an angular, multi-fingered, outstretched hand. Shapes stretch in different directions. I choose the index finger and head toward its tip. Today is day off and everything stayed in stillness. The cranes in half way, heavy ships slightly lifted on steel constructions, only few solitary fishermen sit by the water gazing out to the other side of the river. I don’t believe they sit there so as not to miss the right time when the fishes come. There are large amounts of chemicals and heavy metals sinking in harbor waters, and mountains of pesticides and other toxic substances. I was surprised when Jonas told me that they used to jump from these industrial bridges on hot summer nights when no one could see. He said it was so high that one had to be cautious when jumping to hit the water surface first with feet, with a straight pose. Once, hitting the surface with an open mouth, he clashed his upper teeth against the lower badly. Maybe it was the last time he jumped.