Film Form Project-Prologue for "Juggernaut"

Needless to say, it's been a looong time since the last post. But alas, such is the world of "zero comment" blogging-but it behooves me to at least keep up the occasional archiving of completed projects for the sake of posterity. Below is an elaborate new "study" for a prologue to my IBM documentary-this version ultimately served as my final "montage" project for Sam Ishii-Gonzalez's Media Practices-Film Form Class(good class, btw- Sam made us adhere to very challenging standards steeped in a strong formalist approach to film's specificity). The project was very well-received. One fellow student described it as "amazing", another compared it to the work of Kenneth Anger.I will post a "making of" series of posts in the future because it involved alot of work and separate phases to put the sequence together. So, behold!!

Situationist Project- Revising the City

This was a project that involved coming up with innovative initiatives to redesign aspects of the city along Situationist lines. Text and photos below.

“We must replace travel as an adjunct of work with travel as a pleasure.”
-Guy Debord
Situationist Thesis on Traffic

In lieu of the recent announcements of an upcoming price increase in the New York City public transportation system, I would suggest some provisional improvements in the infrastructure that would not only create a more entertaining, informative and aesthetically pleasing ambience but would also readdress the hierarchical nature of the museum locus, critique the recuperation of the urban milieu as a spectacularized theme-park and allow for a more open spatial discourse on late capitalism.
The subway line, at present, presents the rider with limited options as to possible vistas-the underground rider in particular is confronted with the banalized tiling and conduits that indoctrinate one into industrial repetition, consumption enticing billboards and wave after wave of stations whose purely utilitarian characteristics have impoverished reality. How much more enjoyable the ride would be if the tunnels were bedecked with great works of art-large scale canvases such as Picassso’s Guernica and the more lengthier canvases of Pollock would be superb. Taking it a step further, the more notable museums of the city could be demolished and rebuilt as long thin corridors running parallel to the track. Of course pedestrians would still be allowed admission if they agreed to step aside periodically in deference to passing trains..

But the entertainment and education of children would also be a concern. I would suggest that once the revolution has commandeered the Disney theme parks, that rides such as Pirates of the Caribbean and The Haunted Mansion be reassembled lengthwise along the track as a history lessons for children as to the exploitation of their ancestors by animatronic social engineering..



The elevated tracks, instead of being repetitively bombarded with the static scopic regime of mathematized high-finance, would be allowed to watch such works as Debord’s In Girum Imus on large screens. There would be optional buttons for riders to slow down the trains in order to peruse points of interest. With the abolition of wage labor, disagreements would be kept to a minimum since no one would be late in getting to work.

S.I.-Psychogeographic Map

Another assignment from the Situationist International Class-this one was a "Psychogeographic Map" of NYC. For those out of the loop, Psychogeography, as defined by wiki, is: "Psychogeography was defined in 1955 by Guy Debord as the "the study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals." Another definition is "a whole toy box full of playful, inventive strategies for exploring cities...just about anything that takes pedestrians off their predictable paths and jolts them into a new awareness of the urban landscape." The most important of these strategies is the dérive." I did an animation consisting of "futuristic utopias" of the past, quotes from S.I. writings and photoshop montages juxtapositioning S.I. aesthetic influences with our current predicaments. The score is an original song by my good friend, Steve Greitzer (a.k.a. Moonbase Alpha).

The Situationist International Class:Adopt-An-Executive

The fact that a university, even one with such a strong regard for Critical Theory and progressive social thought like The New School, would even offer a course based on the works of Guy Debord and the Situationist International is in itself a fairly extraordinary pushing of the limits of curricula into the truly radical. I had seen Debord referenced everywhere-from the Deleuzian Film Studies people to network and new media theorists to the lyrics of bands like The International Noise Conspiracy.When it was promoted in my Understanding Media class by Professor Shannon Mattern, I was nearly certain that I would enroll and ultimately did. Professor Ethan Spigland had studied with the likes of Derrida and Lyotard in Paris and also had a background in filmmaking. The class was certainly time well spent and Ethan has become my primary senior thesis adviser on the ongoing production of my film "Juggernaut". In the next couple of installments, I want to give a brief tour of some of the individual and group projects that were executed in the class. The first of note was a large ongoing group project that several of us embarked upon, a "situation" if you will, called the Adopt-An-Executive Campaign. In lieu of the recent financial crises and subsequent "bailouts", we thought that it would be funny to run a fundraising initiative for the recently "financially inconvenienced" retinue of CEO and other chief execs. It began with several "fundraising events" in Union Square Park and culminated in a website loaded with content
http://adoptanexecutive.com/Site/Home.html

This was a truly prodigious project and hilarious. The group consisted of Juliana Pereira, Lauren Coakley, Noelia Santos, Alexandra Desousa and myself. Great job ladies! (The "adorable little kid" in the video is Alexandra's son-who did a great job. And yes, the redheaded guy is Carrottop.)

Media Concepts- Media Scans

This was a mini-assignment for Media Practices-Concepts. Each student had to do a short presentation called a "Media Scan", presenting some aspect of media that was kind of cool, innovative, paradoxical or challenging in some thoughtful or emergent way. At the time that I was up, we were right in the middle of a slew of drawing assignments-so I decided to do a "scan" which consisted of a slideshow presentation of drawings and sketches from different artists throughout the ages-a little inspiration so to speak. Nuff said...

Photo Slideshow-"Mischievous"

This is the final Slideshow from "Four Approaches" called "Mischievous". It fell under the Discursive category-but was not shot to be such. Actually it's kind of forced and could have been great if I knew that I was doing it "when" I was doing it, if that makes any sense. It features my young cousins, Michael and Nicholas (who made me buy them banana splits in lieu of payment) and the score is from the brilliant Alan Hovhaness. Lights please!

Photo Slideshow-Arty / Intuitive

This was another mini-assignment from the "Slideshow-Four Approaches" assignment. I took it upon myself to combine the "Artsy/Designy" and "Intuitive" subgroups into one assignment (I figured-who would know?) . It's a reworking of some of the photos taken for the "Visitors" shoot. Kit Laybourne, the instructor, had alot of praise for this one (Kit , by the way, among numerous and sundry other accomplishments, was the former Creative Director at The Oxygen Network and author of the seminal "The Animation Book"-so true praise indeed...) The music, for anyone keeping score, is a rare b-side from the band Ultravox called "Dreams". Enjoy.