User:Muxingye Chen/thesis/project

Project Proposal

What do I want to make?

How do I plan to make it?

Why do I want to make it?

Over the past months I have been working on improving my command of narrative in my films.  For my final project I would like to continue working on the short experimental film, which is called “Unframed”.    This film is about how I connect with the absurdity of the reality I find myself in. The work so far was made during the time when Dutch society had been locked down from the middle of March to the beginning of August.

During that period, I experienced the disconnection between my physical body and mental awareness. More specifically, my body was isolated within an eight square-meter room. All this time my awareness travelled through the internet, through propaganda generated by  social media;  “news" in online society:  “The broken relationship between China and America”; “The Covid virus is made as  a chemical weapon by the Chinese military”; “Black lives matter”; “Refugees were rejected at the Hungarian boarder”....    The most influential value that I perceived from this mass of information are numbers and conflicted statements. It brings to me a feeling of being an outcast in the western context, Mentally I could be falling apart anytime because of this venerable global situation.  So, to make my struggle more rational, I filtered it down to three main themes:   1) “How to deal with the paradox that when identity is constructed by physical reality, it is at the time deconstructed by virtual reality”;   2) “The play of Media manipulations”;   3) ”My life has nothing without digitalisation” (we are defined by numbers and data).

I have been working on methods of visual storytelling throughout lockdown period, by making 3d characters, dialogue, various activities, within a virtual environment.

But the fact remains that those elements are more related to emotional self-expression.

The images in my work are abstractions, a personal response to events; they reflect the feeling of distancing and being an outsider. The Covid times amplify these feelings to a larger extent. 

However, when it comes to a film with clear narratives, the first experiment that I did during the lockdown did not fully succeed in transforming personal emotions to rational film structures, especially how the elements interact with each other and produce context. Therefore, there are a few points I want to address regarding the images I make: to figure out the conflicts of identity in specific times and specific situations; to make clearer my own position in this context. 

The outcome of the further experiments will involve certain adjustments and achievements : I want the work to express these uncertain, paradoxical situations. This requires a re-assessment of the elements in my work in order to communicate more directly. 

Because of my educational and cultural background. I barely feel a sense of belonging. So, these questions are amplified in covid times, and the large themes of the current day appear superficial. I would like to go deeper and invite people to slow down and not so easily come to judgment. I would like to use the film I have been working on as an experimental bed .

In practical terms, I will address the following issues : 

How to reorganise visual elements within a context that is more accessible and understandable. 

More precisely, the use of sound;  The role of dialogue (if needed) To give precise explanations of the figures, [body shapes, gestures, conditions] How the figures interact with their environment. [to underly and absurdity in the situation] How to organise the conversations between the characters;  what is the value of the objects inside the context presented;  what is the purpose of this context?  creating a series of events that have consequence…"

The use of sound; building on the approaches I have made so far:I have got rid of the music track; I propose to add sound FX of steps, breathing &c." Recording self-made sound FX which are very direct (all based on my body). Reconsider the hard drum beats which appear in the storyline, especially on the scene where I introduce the circumstances. To utilise digital sound effect on the condition when characters are conflicting with massive manipulated information (quick glitch sound, signal wave in the industrial noise). Balancing the dynamic from the Soundscape (representing the bleakness of the landscape where all characters were shaped as robots in a factory, Mongolian overtone singing can be used, for example).

More precise explanations of the figures: building on the approaches I have made so far: modelling myself as a 3d character; rethinking the clothes elements which communicate the current circumstances more directly (the corona mask material, for instance). All character have different speaking tones, habitual expressions (A character who has null expression all the time, and continuously talking to himself in the group conversation, for instance)

What is the value of the objects inside the context presented; building on the approaches I have made so far: more elements should be added (adding mirrors in front of characters when they are chatting with each other; a water floor in the completely white space; characters are confined in the bottle, (like Samuel Beckett) instead of sitting on the chair, for instance). The different conditions and dynamic elements (every time a character lies to himself in the mirror, the mirror becomes blurred, and takes part of his body for instance).

What is the purpose of this context? Building on the approaches I have made so far: the large white space in the first scene represents the limitation and emptiness of the situation, the condition that the characters have in this space illustrates the absurdity in their reality (for instance: only thing they can do inside is greet with each other with indifferent expressions, there will be only one character who is really interact with others – they see him as psycho).

Who can help me?

I think Michael and Manetta can help me with technical and conceptual issues. I think I will need help with creating the content as well, maybe I need somebody that has a theatre background but I don't have somebody yet (need to do more research). I think Clara Balaguer can help me with the writing as well. I would love to talk to Nishant Shah since I saw him last year at the Impakt Festival. I am interested in the work of Olia Lialina as well but not sure if it relates. In general I find that talking about the project as much as I can with pears and tutors helps me a lot.

Relation to previous practice

As an experienced designer I was always very interested in the way we interact with interfaces, especially our emotional connection. My job was to understand people's behaviour while using digital interfaces. The goal was to design everything to be "seamless" and "invisible" which made me think critically about it and ask if this applies to every interface we encounter. I feel it is positive to understand what we use and not just accept it as it is. Moreover, I feel we as makers have the power to engage people emotionally with our work. While building the module in special issue 10 it was important for me for it to be interactive and playful so I based it on a childhood game that I loved - the "etch a sketch" . I thought that probably more people know it but even if they don't it is a straightforward and simple tool for engagement. Moving forward, I want to develop my practice toward a deeper understanding of human-computer interaction and the way we can reflect on it and be critical towards it. Regarding my research, last year I began writing and documenting my work in the form of a journal for the first time. I found this to be a helpful way for me to process and develop ideas. In my work I don’t like to presume that I can tell people how to think or feel or toward what they should be critical of. I use my personal experience to relate to a collective one. That is why my writing is also part of my research.

Relation to a wider context

I feel it is important to give our attention and make room for different uses of the online space. My work is just an example of the possibilities but hopefully many people could relate or find it interesting. These are some examples of other works I relate to while doing my project:

• Olia Lialina's work made me understand that I need to define what cyberspace means to me, because it has different meanings to different people. In the context of the project, when I refer to cyberspace I mean a place where people meet online with an emphasis on the emotional connection and less on the technical side (the technical is a tool for the emotional).

• The project “Chimeria:Grayscale” uses the email interface to tell a story about sexual harassment in the workplace.

• The book Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace by Janet H. Murray encouraged me to explore the digital space as a place for narratives.

References

• Janet H. Murray, (1997). Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace. New York: The Free Press.
• Sherry Turkle, (2011). Alone Together. New York: Basic Books.
• Olia Lialina, (2015). Not Art & Tech. Universität für angewandte Kunst Wien [online]. Available at: http://contemporary-home-computing.org/art-and-tech/not/

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