For years, abstract new media art has always been my personal favorite genre. The majority of traditional abstract art that I’ve viewed, no matter how magnificent, simply seems to fail at expressing a sense of individual life. The sense that the object or piece that the spectator is viewing truly is looking back through the screen.
As an example, I greatly admire the work of the new media artist Geoffrey; particularly that of his homepage, Oculart.
Each artwork is particularly unique with a sense of mystery that causes many viewers I have spoken to have spent more time being creeped out by it to the point where they refuse to try to understand and immerse themselves within the mindset of the artist.
In a room with no distractions; if you turn on your speakers and simply take a few minutes analyzing a piece or two, more and more small details come into play. Sometimes it seems impossible to shake the feeling that although each piece is a composition of dissonant sound and small loops of animation within a larger context, that the piece itself doesn’t have a mind of its own.
Looking in the left-hand column some particular pieces I’d like to note are ‘hey death’, ‘funeral garden’, ‘harp siesta’, and ‘la noye`e’. Each artwork has at least one element that fakes the mind into expecting more to happen. It’s as if the viewer’s mind secretly craves some sort of fright or connection with the world lying beyond their computer screen.
In one particular interview Geoffrey mentioned. “I think there are two types of animation, one which is narrative (traditional), and animation that is a still piece of work but uses motion to provoke a further fantasy and work engagement.” That being the case, I suppose it was his purpose all along to coax the viewer away from their own grasp of reality.
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I really enjoyed checking out the Oculart website. I can definitely see what you are saying about the mystery of the pieces. Through these different narratives he seems to be telling a story while letting us draw our own conclusions about what may be going on. I was especially drawn to the piece entitled Saunter Saunter because I found myself waiting for something to happen while at the same time trying to figure out what the work could mean. A lot of the pieces on his website give you an uneasy feeling, or create some type of anticipatory anxiety. The themes are definitely fantasy-like in nature.
ReplyDeleteI'm slightly familiar with this artist because I was introduced to him in one of my media art classes. We were learning how, although looped, you can give the piece a sense of 'freedom' with the way you compose it. I really like how, although a little strange, he gives each piece a certain mood of heightened anticipation with not only the context but with his use of sound and movement as well.
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