Unit 3 Film & Moving Image Research – The Female World in Film by Women, A Synergistic Affair.
- Sarah Chalkie Cloonan
- Aug 19, 2021
- 4 min read
Updated: Sep 26, 2021
This is a medium with which I could unite all my ideas, my four pathways, and include my magical domestic every day was a sentiment I held in unit 2.
I thought that by projecting on my canvases assemblages and collages I may be able to visually weave one in to the other and unite all my ideas, my four pathways, highlighting and making central my magical domestic every day.
Doing some further reading about female rage and empowerment from material which has surfaced serendipitously in my every day I have deduced that Pipilotti Rist video Color is Dangerous work is the obvious inspiration behind the Beyonce video for her track Hold Up. From the Album Lemonade.
This mainstream exposure of the ideas has created interesting outcomes, - although I don’t think it will reach the audience that make up my parents, it has permutated popular media and beyond since 2016.
Click the Image for a Link to the Video.
Beyonce appears in Amazonian yellow as an empowered woman - she has done what her grandmother suggested, in "All Night" another track from the album "Lemonade" ‘if life gives you lemons make lemonade.”(BeyoncéVEVO - YouTube, no date)
The video contains many references, her work is linked into her life, as a woman, mother, artist, wife. As well as being a person of colour, with historical links to her heritage and her current position in society. She brings her past forward and advocates a stronger future.
She borrows the imagery from "color is dangerous" to display female rage and take a swing at her husband, she reveals her frustrations as a cuckolded wife, her anger at his behaviour and despair at his naivety. There is also a little dig or nod at the fact that she is annoyed at the public nature of this indiscretion and betrayal, as she takes out the camera with a forceful swing in the final frame, but she owns the act, she is a warrior, and she gets her message across.
I’m with Adel on this one, she is a very powerful advocate for female empowerment. (Recording Academy / GRAMMYs, no date)
Since the albums success the ethos has been used to set up academic syllabuses to address the subjects she explores within the work.
Nataly Hynes in her book and pod casts, exclaims ‘Beyonce is not a women to be messed with’ and recounts a few lines, including: “What’s worse, looking jealous or crazy?”(Natalie Haynes Stands Up for the Classics - Series 1 - Aspasia - BBC Sounds, no date).
Pipilotti Rist - Color is Dangerous - (Channel, 2016)image linked to the video and an interview.
11 Artists Working with Moving Images - image linked to the video.
This video includes Joan Jonas, Wim Wenders, Pipilotti Rist, Laurie Anderson, Bill Viola, and Jonas Mekas amongst other who have been popping up in my research over the last three years, so I’m not the only one who feels there is a connection between them and what it is I’m interested in, the wonder, life, and the way they use film to explore the world.
This is beginning to make more sense to me, and I can slowly see how I might use film.
My daughters have been filming for their school art projects, One A-level the other GCSE I have been used as an assistant, allowing me to combine both my domestic duties as mum with my own work, this is the way I really enjoy working with no boundaries set, up no rules or division between the domestic and the everyday and not much of a timetable.
Things just happen in their own way, relaxed no stress and all the time in the world.
This image of Loli my youngest daughter, is part of a film my middlest (no 2 of 3) daughter Issy made. I had needed some footage to set up a tiny new projector which could connect to my phone, the film became quite magical when distorted and transparent, shinning on my canvas.
This is very much part of what I feel is magical in my domestic every day. I’m taking directly from what happens around me, not instigated by me but experienced me. By capturing it I am able to revisit a moment that has passed.
A photography friend suggested I had a look at Cig Harvey, she likes to shine images on to surfaces creating atmospheric pieces referencing the magical in the domestic -
Finally I revisited my previous work connect with Film and read though my Blogs and Notes 2019/20.
I have realised that I cannot just take what Ive been making and push it in to a film. It does not fit the context of what I am doing.
I want to lurk on a wall and play with paint film would be much later.
I recall the observations I made of Mark Bradfords Films included in ‘Cerberus’ his first exhibition at Hauser & Wirth in 2019, where the films where incongruous and jarred but may be thats what he wanted.
My moving imagess would not sit well with the paintings they need another platform, it would be a battle between the two mediums. Any moving images I make I will put on my website, as curiosities.
I have opened new doors for this in the future but the time is too limited now And I havent an Anna or an Angel to work with - I like to have the collaborative input from a partner in crime and a technician. Although saying that our roles shifted so much during our collaboration who wore which hat was some times unclear….except Anna was always right.
https://www.youtube.com/user/beyoncevevo (Accessed: 16 August 2021).
Channel, L. (2016) Pipilotti Rist: Color is Dangerous. Available at: https://vimeo.com/167880482 (Accessed: 19 August 2021).
Installation (no date) Cig Harvey. Available at: https://www.cigharvey.com/installation (Accessed: 19 August 2021).
Natalie Haynes Stands Up for the Classics - Series 1 - Aspasia - BBC Sounds (no date). Available at: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b040hjy4 (Accessed: 14 July 2021).
Newstalk (no date) Adele’s Grammy Tribute to Beyonce. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJOwr8OyoSc (Accessed: 16 August 2021).
Recording Academy / GRAMMYs (no date) Adele Wins Album Of The Year | Acceptance Speech | 59th GRAMMYs. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctuggqUSITM (Accessed: 16 August 2021).
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