Postmodern Exhibition

On Wednesday 26th October, I went to the V&A to visit the Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970-1990 exhibition. It was really interesting, informative, inspiring and thought-provoking. (Click here for a BBC video of the exhibition.)

I took lots of notes during the exhibition and learnt a great deal while there.
The exhibition took you through the beginning of Postmodernism right up until (and past) it's death. 

"After all, since it is fairly dead, we might as well enjoy picking over the corpse" - Charles Jencks
As I entered the exhibition I was greeted with this quote and a definition of Postmodernism, in that it "defies definition" but is the most controversial of recent art movements. 
One way of describing it was that it is "like a broken mirror, a reflecting surface made of many fragments". It's key principles were complexity and contradiction and it "shattered the established ideas about style", bringing "a new self-awareness about style itself".

"Whoever decides to abandon the modern movement can choose between Versailles and Las Vegas" - Italian Critic Bruno Zevi in 1967. Zevi was essentially saying that the primary ingredients of Postmodernism at the beginning were ("both/and rather than either/or" - Robert Venturi) high classicism and 'low' pop culture.

Robert Venturi and his partner Denise Scott Brown are very influential architects and in 1972 published a book called Learning From Las Vegas. They also used a lot of collage between the 60s and 70s that used 'Historicism' whose central aim was "to replace a monolithic idiom with a plurality of competing ideas and styles." This was the start of moving from modernism into postmodernism. 

Giulio Paolini's sculpture of L'altra (The Other Figure) from 1984 stood out to me as it plays on the high classicism of the past, but gives it a melancholic edge that is more sad and introspective. 

I have looked at Robert Rauschenberg in the past and have always admired his work so it was interesting to see his work 'Estate' from 1963 feature. 

This follows on the theme of collage, but is developed into 'Bricolage' which is a cut and paste technique.
Anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss defined a bricoleur as "someone working with 'oddments leftover from human endeavours'. 
Therefore if modernist objects were based around utopia, progress and machine-like perfection, postmodern objects seemed to come from a dystopian and far-from-perfect future. 

The exhibition used this clip from Blade Runner (1982) to show this change in thinking, as it dwells on the possibilities and consequences of living in a 'post-human' age.

Moving into the 1980s Postmodernism developed into the New Wave movement. It was the dominant look of the 'designer decade' with vivid colours, theatricality and exaggeration. Everything was a style statement. This change reflected the desire to combine subversive statements with commercial appeal. Magazines and music were the most important delivery systems for this new phase of postmodernism. 

Italian design group Memphis became the forefront for postmodern design and architecture and was started by Ettore Sottsass. The created a 'new international style' and a period style of 'brash colour, vivid pattern and expressive form'.
Meanwhile the energy of the post-punk subculture was broadcast through music videos and cutting-edge graphics. 

It was a few thrilling years where image was everything.

Boy George was part of the New Romantic movement that was huge during the 1980's. Dancers, art directors, choreographers, pop stars, drag queens and nightclubbers were all the unlikely authors of some of postmodernism's most influential style statements. Blade Runner's investigations of identity (Rachael's belief that she is human, when in fact she's a replicant, synthetic life form) are often cited in discussions of postmodern experience. 

Gender was explored, as boys and girls started dressing as each other. Annie Lennox is an example of a pop star who challenged gender norms, showing that androgyny wasn't incompatible with mainstream appeal. 
MTV was launched in 1981 (which I've looked at previously) and so the rise of music videos meant another platform for postmodernism and were vital in broadcasting postmodernist ideas to mainstream culture.
Viewers were presented with a series of celebs posturing before the camera.
There were many examples shown in the exhibition which demonstrate the wide range of musical styles in which postmodern techniques were explored from hiphop to new romantic to techno.

1982

1988

I found looking at the different music videos really useful and made me look at editing my video a little differently. 

"If postmodernism means anything is allowed then I was all for it."

- David Byrne (Talking Heads)

Postmodern graphics and photography involved bricolage, fragmentation and quotation.

Peter Saville was responsible for a number of Joy Division and New Order's album art, where he used 'found' art images.

Magazines such as 'The Face' and 'i-D' produced many postmodernist covers...

By blending the avant-garde and commercial they were a postmodern phenomenon. 
April Greiman and Jayme Odgers used cut and paste to produce posters...

Paula Scher produced posters for Elvis Costello...

Money, however, became a huge issue in the 1980s due to living in Thatcher's Britain. 

Andy Warhol 'Dollar Sign' 1981

Warhol's ironic acknowledgement of his own works market value exemplifies postmodernism in its final stage. Postmodernism collapsed under the weight of its own success. It participated in the culture obsessed with wealth and status that was the undoing of the movement. 
"Money doesn't mind if we say it's evil, it goes from strength to strength. It's a fiction an addiction, and a tacit conspiracy." - Martin Amis

'Protect Me From What I Want' by Jenny Holzer, Times Square, 1985

By the end of the 1980s postmodernism was no longer a radical subcultural style. It had gone mainstream.

Han Dynasty Urn with Coca-Cola Logo by Ai WeiWei, 1994

Ai WeiWei used a 2000 year old urn for the piece above. Ironically after he'd defaced it and turned it into contemporary art it became even more valuable than before.

Postmodernism left behind a set of unresolved intellectual provocations. It was marked with a sense of loss, even destructiveness, but also a radical expansion of possibilities. 
In the permissive, fluid and hyper-commodified situation of design today, we're still feeling its effects. In that sense, like it or not, we are all postmodern now.

The exhibition closed with New Order's video for Bizarre Love Triangle (1986).
The bizarre editing effects and montage style is very influential and the symbolic images make it a memorable postmodern music video. 

Forest Shoot

The forest shoot on Sunday went well. As it only features in the video for about a minute, the shoot took a lot less time than I was anticipating. The weather was nice and clear and the sun shone through the trees at times so I managed to get some great shots.
Here is my shot list from the shoot...

Here are some of the pictures I got that may be used for my album cover. 

Whilst filming I came up with a shot of the artist running away from the camera further and further into the forest, which symbolises letting the relationship go, and that it is now just a memory (helped by the white blouse which is ghost-like). 

Me filming

I'm now going to try to put a rough cut together of what I've got so far before I film the river location.

Preliminary Filming

Last Sunday I met up with my actress and we did some preliminary filming. To begin with we shot the Interlude scenes, which you can see below...

I learnt a lot from this first shoot. Firstly to be very aware of whether or not the camera is recording(!). Also how hard it is to direct! Getting the actress in the right place and doing what you need is very hard, especially when you are friends, but I'm working on my communication skills. Doing the constrained interlude scenes may first may not have been the best idea because once we'd gone down to the river location it was easier to let the actress be more natural and laid back which looked great on camera.
I used my first prop...

Which didn't go amazingly well...

... as it kind of sunk. I will bring back up boats next time we film in the location to try and rectify that problem.

While out filming the camera battery died, so I've definitely remembered to charge all the equipment fully for today. I've also learnt to try out lots of angles to see what works and to use what is available to you, such as lens flares and other natural objects around you. 

Risk Assessment

I need to do a risk assessment in order for my artist and myself to remain safe during filming...


Location 1 - River

Location 2 - Beach

Location 3 - Forest

The forest location is a public footpath and I will bring a map, torch and phone in order to not get lost and stay on the official paths. 

Location 4 - Plain Walled Room

As this is in my house, I feel this location is reasonably safe. I will make sure my artist knows where she is going and that all furniture and wires are in safe positions so no one can trip up.

Casting

I have casted the female lead for my music video...

I think Kati will be a good protagonist as she is very engaging on camera as she was also my model for my music magazine last year. She is also quiet a good actress and I think fits well with the genre and the effect I'm trying to achieve as she is natural, fun and energetic. 

We are meeting up this weekend to arrange when we are both free for filming.
We shall also discuss costumes, which I will then post about. We may rehearse a few shots and I'll make sure she has a copy of the lyrics which she can practise so the lip-syncing looks professional. 

Scouting Locations #2

I stepped out on a gorgeous September day last week to scout out the Beach location for my video. 

Below is where the first 18 seconds will be filmed with the artist singing the first few lines of the song. 

Here I focused on the waves with the pebbles on the beach, which will make a nice cutaway shot.

The waves were looking really good, so I filmed some practice shots of the waves crashing. 

I then walked over to the fishing boat area which is a new idea I had as part of the video. I think having the artist walking between and sing amongst the boats will look good.

Then I went over the bridge to look at the cliff area. 

In the sun it looked really beautiful, but perhaps the sun isn't the right atmosphere for the video. The twilight and the darkness might be more edgy, but the start of the video may begin in brighter light, so as to contrast with the rest of the video. Then so as to highlight the parallels between the start and end of the song, I could revert back to brighter light, so as to visually signify that she has 'come through the darkness' and is now moving on.

The cliffs will be a great backdrop for 0:37-0:45.

And the above angle will be brilliant for 0:19-0:36 and 0:46-0:53, especially as it is usually quiet along this section of the beach so it will look even better.

One thing I realised as I walked onto the beach was that the tide was coming in, reminding me that I will definitely need to check the tide times before shooting, so as not to be caught out.

Scouting Locations #1

Yesterday I managed to go to my first location - the river/ grassy area.
As we have just had Summer things have wildly overgrown and there is a lot of greenery. This will probably die down as we head into Winter, so depending on when I film the locations may change slightly. I quite like the idea of a more bare, wintery feel, but time constrictions may not allow for this.

 As well as the river there is a woodland area on the way to the river beach that may be good for a few scenery shots for cutaways.

Here is the grassy beach area of the river location. The grass was a lot taller than I expected so may be hard to film in. Also there are risks involved which I will go into in my Risk Assessment.

1:41-1:49 includes a shot of rapids of the river, so it was good to take some test shots of this to use. There are also plenty of stones for the artist to throw into the river. I did a few test shots of the 1:50-1:58 shot which I will post later...

One issue that I found was that the ripples were quickly moved away by the running water.
Below you can see the density of the grass...

But also there is a more sparse patch which I probably won't use, but may be a good place for some running about or dancing.

Next I travelled to a different location, crossed a bridge...

... and went to the location for 2:28-2:41, which can be seen in my practice video for Run.

Under the bridge may be a good 'plan b' location if it starts to rain.

 I took a few shots there last year and they turned out quite well. Below is an example...

Further up, there is a field that maybe useful for a few shots of the artist running around in.

There is also a waterfall that I also used last year (see below), but it has changed a lot and has overgrown so I probably won't use it. 

However, I managed to get some great shots of the water that I could use. 


I'm looking forward to getting to the other locations this week to see how they'll work out as well.