Object #1: 'Marie' - A previous personal work, short video
This turned out to be a surprisingly important work for me. It was a class project, and albeit, I was not particularly enthused about the assignment. 'Marie' portrays a glimpse of a man grieving for his loved one who perished in New York on September 11th, 2001 during the catastrophic events. As it turned out, I was due to present this short on the one-year anniversary of the event and I felt compelled to commemorate it. This short is important to me because it strongly conveys exactly the feelings I was hoping to communicate. Feelings which even now I can't help but think I would somehow trivialize or mutate should I declare them in written words - as I think that at least partly, the reason the short 'succeeds' is that it is a purely visual and unspoken communication which transpires.
It is a relevant work because to this date, I have seen very little within the art & media world that at least attempts to understand the events from an intimate perspective.
Object #2: 'War Photographer' -- A Film by Christian Frei with James Nachtwey
This is a documentary about world-renowned war photographer James Nachtwey. The film's director followed Nachtwey for two years into the wars in Indonesia, Kosovo, Palestine and others. This doc has been one of the films, or for that matter, media objects/events, that have moved me most in my life. The film candidly displays Nachtwey and reveals this thoughtful and unobtrusive man perform at his absolute best during moments of absolute worst. Nachtwey's very being represents something he often talks about in the film, something that noticeably haunts him and consumes him: the inherent contradictions present in the very thing that he does (i.e. the desire to create artful imagery from real-life tragedy). This brings the themes of the film to a philosophically and intellectually heightened place while simultaneously documenting human drama also at its climax. Again, the ways in which these inherent contradictions are slowly and benevolently revealed imprint the viewer's mind with soft layer after layer of meaning and awareness.
An inspiring technique was invented for the film: video micro-cameras are attached to Nachtwey's still camera. This enables us to hear every breath of his and to participate in the act of shooting his war photos. The intimate insight into how Nachtwey chooses his subject, his framing and his 1/60th sec moment amazing to me. Something felt new to me here, cinema had accessed a new possibility. It was a visceral feeling and I didn't (still don't) fully comprehend what I was experiencing nor why it was so powerful. All I can say is that all those layers of meaning, on top of the “participatory/interactive” one, created an important work full of potential, much of it realized - and that which wasn't, was equally poignant because it pointed at a possible future, at possible forms only bound by the limits of our imagination.
I made two short-format documentaries not too long after seeing War Photographer; one was about North African Muslim migrant workers in the agricultural south of Spain and the other about a neglected and nearly forgotten gypsy ghetto in the outskirts of a large southern town. I wrestled with contradictions throughout the entire process.
Object #3: 'The Sims'- A game by Maxis / EA
The Sims is important to me because it was the first game that emphasized people within its own world, its own gameplay. It wasn't about one 'fantastical' character in one 'fantastical' world - fantasy has never engaged me - it was about creating your own individual/s and seeing how its life unfolded within a game that was 'closely' (relatively) modeled after real contemporaneous first-world life. I am not an avid player but every time I play I do feel a strong sense of potential. The game does facilitate escapist activities, but what about the idea of a war photographer Sim in a war-torn Sim world?
Analysis:
These three objects are similar in that the subject at hand is a person/group of persons and their stories. Additionally, though each is a very specific iteration of life, they all attempt to represent modern day life, as most of us know it. The first two items clearly share much in common: they examine a slice of human drama at its most difficult to comprehend and to accept.
One obvious difference is the form they each take: a short fictive video, a long-format documentary, and a simulation/game. The Sims differs greatly from the other two in that it does not attempt to represent one very crafted, very specific, very meaning-heavy experience - rather it offers the potential for this but by no means does it encourage it.
There have been personal accounts about 911 on the internet - stories about grief and loved ones and psychological turmoil. I have not spent much time absorbing these, but I cannot think of many mass-scale pieces about it. There have been didactic documentaries (i.e. Frontline) and countless snippets of personal accounts on television. There was the theatrically released collection of shorts ''11'09'01'' (directed by Sean Penn, Mira Nair, Iñarritu, and others), but I have not had a chance to see it yet. There have also been counter narratives about the events online: alternate perspectives (I do not like to use the term 'conspiracy theories') sometimes realized as quite engaging videos and interactive presentations - but again, they are obscure and not usually intimate explorations on the effects of losing loved ones on this complex and contentious day.
There is a narrative film entitled 'Harrison's Flowers' about a war photographer in Kosovo that goes missing and his wife who goes searching for him, never believing he is dead. It is also an important film for me, and even with all its possible/probably flaws, it still deals with human drama at its most evil (Kosovo) and at its most transcendent (bond between two individuals) in interesting ways.
Well, 'The Sims' has countless iterations and manifestations: expansion packs galore and so forth. One other game I can think of that may stress similar themes and offer similar possibilities is 'Second Life', though I have not yet played it.
I am interested in drama - I am most engaged by (interesting) people and the ways in which they choose to live out their one chance at life and the ways in which they choose to die. I am interested in situations in which the ABSOLUTE worst and ABSOLUTE best in us is explored. I am most interested in the form of simulation -- yet what does this mean (to me)?????
