messy lil' jots


Last night I watched a video on William Kentridge that David passed on to me. In many ways Kentridge's work process illustrates the point I am trying to make or the questions I am exploring.
The content of his work is not what I am focusing upon, moreso the way he works.
When I talk of improvising I am not suggesting the animator skips over the whole pre-production process. This is exactly the question. How can it/pre-production be set up to provide the "vehicle" of improvisation for the animator to explore ideas.
Kentridge's act of animating during the production stage is very physical. His work is extensively researched, and the preproduction is meticulously designed so as to create the perfect environment for which to produce an animation that allows for a large percentage of spontaneous/intuitive creation. His technique is very focused...Meaning that, and I'll have to qualify this presumably if its to enter my paper, it seems his production process has been developed via a natural progression or path as an artist entering a medium that best a) expresses his ideas and b) realises (certain elements of) his ideas within the act of creation.

note to me and you: Kentridge's animations are on at ACMI

..just notes...

Had a chat to D on Friday and somehow sensed a bit of ground under my feet afterwards.

Animator of the week: Daniel Guyonnet.

He is a Parisian fellow.
Some of his work reminds me of Geoff Ricardo -Melbourne printmaker, Joost Swarte-comic artist-Belgian(?) and Al MacInnes-Melbourne animator. Splendid little walk cycles that hunch and flip. There's a wonderful sense of swing to his timing, you could almost dance to watching it. .........hmm weird grammar there, but it makes the point.

hajimarimashita!

I sat down to work on my AIM business plan yesterday, and somehow ended up fiddling around in Flash.
Admittedly I animated.

..it felt good.



eh?
What business plan?

On Tuesday I went to see an exhibition Earth and Sky by G .W. Bot at Australian Works on Paper.
The prints are simply stunning. I am struggling to find the right words to explain how I relate to them
(predominently lino cuts)...They are so delicate and so striking all at once. Their language of marks
is so sensitive and balanced that my whole being feels engaged whilst I stand infront of one.

Last Sunday morning I ate breakfast and gazed for a very long time at one of P.H.'s etchings
.
...I don't really have words for how I feel about his work, not in the context of blogging anyway.
However, I had quiet and private thoughts about animation whenst gazing. Which, later in the week,
I admitted to PH.
These thoughts pertain to improvisation in animation, perhaps not directly to my Ma paper, but certainly
to simple and little ideas I have about production processes.

.

Fragments of thoughts...


Jiri Trnka
.
Beautiful beautiful animations.
What a beautiful outfit the little man has in The Hand

His little legs are fantastic.
..sigh

Michel Ocelot.
Kirikou
.
It was really quite an engaging story, and the use of colour was bold and magnificent.

It has been quite refreshing to see Trnka, Ocelot and Mulloy's animations within the space of a week.
Theres not really any connection between them. Perhaps that they are all animators who have
realised their artistic integrity through a long journey of ..well animating their ideas.

...I also watched alot of Plymton's animations last week. Strangely enough, since viewing Trnka, Ocelot and Mulloy's animations, Plympton's work seems to be quite shallow and unsophisticated. Of course he's a fantastic draftsman, and very b imaginative. ..I suppose he is just operating with different kinds of ideas. His production technique errs towards improvisation, swift inspired trails of visual explorations that often are quite rough and thus rely a little on sound effects. Cartoony.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.......

Not much Chop.


My last day of perching in the loft at PH's abode.
Agnes is still shedding an awful lot of hair and in turn
these hairs have clustered their way across the carpet to permanently afix themselves to nearly every pair of socks that I own. I am most displeased.
Watched Phil Mulloy's animations at ACMI yesterday.
Such lovely, inky raw marks. His drawings are so rough and flustered, but they deliver his ideas perfectly. There were some parts that reminded me of Bruce Petty, the more swift political cartoony parts I suppose.
Overall his ideas are quite clever and sophisticated and the way he portrays his observations of the world are insightful and offer an interesting perspective that can/could only be housed in the form of an animation. Admittedly it was quite hard work to sit throught the whole lot. Why? Well 'coz it was quite gross and thematically pretty dark.

The Sound of Music by
Phil Mulloy



1993, 11 mins, 35mm

(..Welcome to review weekly!)
(tee hee)

Thoughts re ma.....
I have alot of questions that I am exploring. I think I know the answers already, so on the one hand it all seems a little naive to be researching improvisation in animation. I am asking such basic questions with such obvious answers that can be found in any animator's vocabulary or in any animation book, for example, within afew pages of Richard Williams' "The Animator's Survival Kit"
On the other hand ( I quite like this hand metaphor, if I weren't typing I'd be reveling in some form of gesticulation)....on the other hand naivity is a good suit to be in whenst investigating other ways of thinking and being. So thinking that I know the answers, and I do know them I do, is perhaps not a useful strategy whenst researching.
Can I find something else??? I haven't found something else yet. Is there something else to find??
Suddenly I am writing a Country song it seems.
a) A bible and a bus ticket home.

What is the value of improvistion in animation?
Can this be combined with, or inform, or even be utilized through the more efficient(?) animation techniques,methods or tools that are offered through software programmes?

'sall