Text on methods

[STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION]

Abstract/intro
This text functions as an insight into my artistic practice. I will look at a few strands of visual and conceptual ideas which occupy me at the moment. Below I will discuss how my research can be divided into three strands of thinking, and also how this will be translated practically. Then I will talk about a few works.



Currently I am working and researching in three distinct areas: firstly the photographic medium as such, secondly the occult and the mystical, and thirdly LGBTQI related themes and queer cinema. I see my work as one on going process, so it is not necessarily project based. The occult and the mystical overlaps with my research in queer cinema and my photography overlaps with LGBTQI topics. Actually one could say al three areas are not so distinct and overlap each other one way or another.

What am I working on now:
Photo:
My photographic work is on the one hand about looking and on the other hand about the photographic medium itself, the photo as an object, the materiality of it but also what they communicate and how they relate to the real world. Questions that arise are: why does the subject affect me? What do I leave in? What do I leave out? What kind of analogies are created by putting these images together?

In my photographic practice I collect images, these can be taken digitally or analogue, but can also be found footage, collage, scientific images or digital collages. Sometimes images are staged, sometimes it just happens to me. By ‘curating’ these collected images I want to create new analogies between them. I photograph to 'collect' but also to get closer to people and objects. Inherent to photography is the gaze, what I photograph gives away my way of looking and what I am interested in. Particularly I am interested in the gay gaze or the queer gaze. Yet photography is always personal and objective for me because of the giving away of the gaze. The objects that I depict are often men, rocks, outer space images, people, daily life snapshots, but also abstract images. The idea of an archive plays a role as I sometimes come back to images previously taken years before. It is not important for me when the photograph is taken, if I suddenly come across an image of 5 years ago and it seems to have a relationship with images I took yesterday then it makes total sense to me to put these images together.

Film:
Secondly I am focused in making the cinematographic language my own. I do this through making short experimental films. Important research area's here are queer (or gay) cinema, magic and rituals. I also would like to use some CGI elements in these films when I'm more acquainted with the medium. The interest in magic and rituals started after seeing work by Maya Deren and Kenneth Anger, (see previous essay). It is also interesting how magic and rituals seem to find their way back again in contemporary art. Perhaps this is due the uncertain times we experience right now, Ernesto de Martino described the role of rituals and magic as a way for individuals to try to regain control again in times of uncertainty and confirm their presence in the world.

Below you can find two video's of my first experiments with the cinematic language. Here I try to conceive a mystical/uncanny atmosphere through the use of colorful light and performance. The first film, untitled 2017, is a film with no narrative in color and in black and white. There is a young man, partly undressed looking and laughing in front of the camera, also a glass of water is being poured in slowmotion and in reverse.

The second video also has no narrative but has a more performative element to it. Here you see Jordi a friend of mine, dressed up as he sometimes does to go out at night. I again set up light with color gels to give it a more surreal or fantasy like aura. I asked him to shave my hair while I was lying on his couch. This action naturally has a lot of connotations.

(analysing films of: kenneth anger, derek jarman, ursala mayer, brucelabruce, Alejandro jodorovski, Sergei Parajanov)

What do you want to work on?

There are several things I want to work on. One of them has to do with reacting to rising homophobic, xenophobic, and racist developments in the Netherlands (or Europe, or the world even). I am interested in incorporating self-defense for the LGBTQI community in a video project as in there has been an increase in violent hate crimes against the LGBTQI community in the Netherlands. First I will follow a class organized by ’t Tijgertje which already organizes self-defense classes for 35 years for LGBTQI people. They practise Krav Maga which is an Israeli self-defense method which is often used by the armed forces. The techniques are based on involuntary reflexes which have evolved naturally and which we all use for survival purposes. After experiencing this personally I can tell if this is gonna be something I want to pursue and use in a next film.

Who can help you and how?
I think it is interesting to work with friends and/or people that can add something to my work. The tutors at Piet Zwart can help me with feedback and tips and practical problems. And I think I also want to use the resources available at De Willem de Kooning Academy more.

Relation to previous practice

Relation to a larger context

Mostly I am drawn to queer cinema and queer artists. My way of presenting photographic work and how to treat the photobook as an object relates to the way Wolfgang Tillmans presents his work in a nonhierarchical way. Tillmans pays attention to the space and reorganising the images according to that. He sees the exhibition space aswell as his books as larger compositions, so the installations for example are always site-specific. The Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam has one of those site-specific installation in their collection. But it is not only in presentation that I feel connected to his work. =

Outline practices or ideas that go beyond the scope of your personal work. Write briefly about other projects or theoretical material which share an affinity with your project. It is simply about showing an awareness of a broader context, which you will later build upon in your project proposal and writing component in the second year (you may have covered some of this in your interview) (200) [what is annotation, in this case: what do you mean by this? S]

Research strands

Consider the possibilities open to you and where you would take your work in the near future. Don't just give a list of book titles or works but outline in your own words what issues are at stake (200)

General note= consider the role of images and links to video (if you want your proposal to take the form of a wiki/web page)