« August 2006 | Main | October 2006 »
September 30, 2006
New Directions
I've been taking photographs since about 1970, indeed photography played an important part in my Degree show at Liverpool Art College. After college I set up a studio doing graphic design and photography, in Leeds, with Monty, a friend from college.
All that was on negative or transparency, now I have made the transition to digital, which has its advantages and disadvantages but hey! we've got to move with the times.
I have of late been doing more photography than painting it has to be said. I don't know why exactly, it's just a line I've been following. Here's one by way of testing if the upload facility still works after the recent outage:
Posted by john at 06:45 PM | Comments (1)
September 29, 2006
OOPS!
Ah, there you are.
Well I expect you imagine I've been up to all sorts of dark and dangerous deeds while ACCESS has been FORBIDDEN.
But no the truth is I've been beavering away at a five minute promo of the Kosovo film. It takes longer to edit a five minute promo that it does the whole 26 minutes, well almost, and I now know why television companies, in the days when there were television companies, employed seperate promo directors, it's hard to hack your film to bits.
If ever I work out how [ie Jonathan tells me how] I'll put a clip on here.
Posted by john at 06:05 PM | Comments (2)
September 20, 2006
Art is alive and well and living in Huddersfield
Martin arrived in Huddersfield today to discuss a film project in Redcar [more of which later if we get the green light] and he found students from the excellent Greenhead College Art Department wrapping the statue of Harold Wilson outside the station.
I met him, and them, and Martin took this picture on his phone, sent it to my phone, and I uploaded it here: [don't ask me how all this works, I can still remember picking up the phone and a lady asking me what number I wanted]
photo - Martin Riley
I went to the A level art show at Greenhead College, last year, and a lot of the work was better than some degree shows I've been to it has to be said, I bought a picture by the very talented Julia Roebuck, currently at Chelsea College of Art:
acrylic on canvas, detail
It's great to see students actually getting up and doing something. There's not enough of it happening.
Posted by john at 07:40 PM | Comments (0)
September 18, 2006
But is it art?
When I was at the Bruce Nauman exhibition in Amsterdam with Jim and Wayne and Gavin and Billy and Martin, Jim took this picture:
The inscription on the wall reads:
“If you see yourself as an artist and you function in a studio and you are not a painter, if you don’t start out with some canvas, you do all kinds of things – you sit in a chair or pace around. And then the question goes back to what is art? And art is what an artist does, just sitting around in his studio.”
Hummm… this could lead to all sorts of trouble, and indeed has if you look at a great deal of the stuff churned out today in the name of art. It’s that first clause that’s the problem: “If you see yourself as an artist..” which gives us: “I am an artist therefore everything I do is art.” Which gives us Tracey’s bed.
Art must needs be something beyond mere existence. Art should be the illumination of existence not just the presentation of it.
Posted by john at 12:15 PM | Comments (2)
September 11, 2006
Old projects don’t disappear they just get more interesting
I’ve managed to hook up my VCR to the Z1 and record from a VHS to HDV, thence to my G5. [Ha ha] The upshot of all those 1960's Space Movie abbreviations is that I can now edit the Unstuck Dance, worked out two years ago with Rachel Brooker, digitally on the computer. Hoorah!
I’ve begun overlaying text and mixing the two takes we did at the time. I want to animate some text too and maybe extend the sequence, which currently stands at just over four minutes.
Then show the project as part of an installation in November. More on this later.
Posted by john at 09:43 PM | Comments (2)
September 09, 2006
Aspect Ratios and Anamorphic Projections
Sorry about the continued lack of posts. I've finished editing the Kosovo film now, and am currently wading, knee deep, in the mire that is DVD burning and in particular aspect rations.
It should look like this:
but tends to come out looking like this:
aaaaarrrrrrgggggggghhhhhh!
Posted by john at 11:47 AM | Comments (0)