Project Proposals

These are the four projects I included on my syllabus:

"Balance"

For this film I would like to manipulate time. "Balance" will concern primarily the everyday balance and juggling act I find myself and other women participating in and often time the absence of grace in the process. Women supposedly possess better balance than men though I am not sure whether this trait is inherent. I hope to film this piece in a gymnastics studio. The focus of the film will be on the gymnast's two feet as they curl and bend around the balance beam to hang on during a routine. The piece will be in black and white and will be slowed down to capture every possible nuance of motion and every curl of a toe. I would like the film to be completely silent and grainy in appearance. The final product should be slow, silent and visually beautiful. 

I was influenced by Steve McQueen's piece, "Bear" here. 

Mcqueen's work is minimalist and visually quite poetic. I think this piece will touch on the aspect of repulsion and seduction I am trying to achieve with the Playboy series I am presently working on in the studio. 

"Reaching"

This film will manipulate reality (the audience may have difficulty discerning whether the actions taking place were staged). The film will be conceptually quite simple. A solitary female figure will sit blindfolded in a chair with her hands tied behind her back. There will be dramatic lighting overhead. This film will also be rendered in black and white to heighten the dramatic effect. The room will be fairly dark save for an overhead light.The woman will stretch her neck to receive the empty offerings of a spoon that is placed near her face. The figure feeding her will never be seen in his entirety. The spoon will grace her face but she will never get the satisfaction of grasping it with her mouth. 

I think this may speak to the sadistic undertones of human nature and the yearning for the "ideal" 

Project 3

This film will manipulate sound and the idea of storytelling.T he film will be in color. I loved the technique of blacking out the background that was used in "Mother's and Fathers." I would like to have a woman (removed from any background) telling a very private and even painful story to the camera. The woman will get visibly upset throughout the short film, crying and shouting about something very painful that happened to her. However, the audience will hear no sound coming from her mouth. Instead, there will be either a song playing or an alternate dialogue that can either serve as a substitution or a metaphor for what the woman is trying very desperately to tell the audience. 

Project 4

This piece will again employ the use of a solitary woman and will also be shot in color. A young woman will sit in a chair and comfortably talk about a childhood story or pleasant memory she holds very dear. The camera will never grace her face. Instead it will pan over her figure slowly, stopping in places for the audience to observe. She will appear as a specimen. The audience should feel uncomfortable at times at the length of the pauses the camera takes. This piece will attempt to employ the viewer as voyeur and will provide commentary on the materialization and compartmentalizing young women are often subject to in the media. 

This project coheres nicely with the ideas I am working with in regard to our culture's materialization of the female form (Playboy and the media).