27 Jan 20

PES

To learn more about using object in stop motion, I also looked into an artist called PES who was born in Santa Monica, California. It’s interesting to know that he also got influenced from Jan Svankmajer. He said his approach to animation is more of narrative than surrealism. Below is his film, Fresh Guacamole, which is a film about the recipe that used other objects as metaphors. For me, I might want to pursue using object in Jan Svankmajer’s approach by digging into the nature of the object itself rather than use it as a representation or substitution of something else. Especially since my exploration is around the theme of identity, it might be more relavant trying to find meaning it object itself.

Jan Svankmajer

Today I visited Jan Svankmajer again for any ideas from his point of view towards objects. For him he seems to like old objects since for him, their memories last longer than us human. He also talked about how objects witnessed certain emotions and situations when people acted in highly emotionally charged situations. It seems like he sees an object as a storage of people emotions which then became its own memories.

13 Jan 20

Today, I would like to research into an animator I admired with animated movies such as The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) and Frankenweenie (2012) and also blockbuster films such as Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) . I would like to particularly study into his approach and thinking process related to stop-motion animation technique and also Surrealism.

Tim Burton

Field/Specialism: Director, producer, screenwriter, artist and animator

Medium: animated films and feature films

Year born: 1958

Years active: 1971-present

Country of birth: U.S.A.

Country based in: Could be Belsize Park, north of London

What topics and ideas does he confront/consider/base his work on?

I chose Frankenweenie as a sample work of him to research about. For this film, he based his idea from memories of his childhood. There is a mention also about kid politics. Everything in the film is based from the people he knew. He drew inspiration from his memory and feeling from the past and applied them into his film.

This made me thought of Jan Svankmajer in a sense that he also drew his inspiration or what he called ‘obsession’ from his childhood experience. Perhaps I might try more in my future film to recollect memories I had of myself and also of people around me as sources of my story.

source: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2012/oct/07/tim-burton-frankenweenie-interview

Who and/or what has influenced him, and his work? (other practitioners, paradigms, social movements, innovations, techniques, laws, films, music etc.)

For Frankenweenie, it was his own childhood experience like his relationship with his parents or with his dog. Also, his watching of the movie, Frankenstein, which brought about the theme of love, life and death. There was a mention also about Dracula. He thinks children need to be exposed to stories around death and horror in order to understand the world.

It is interesting when reflecting back to my own film that if it is going to be defined into a genre, what kind of genre is it going to be? Recently, even with the subversion technique of Surrealism which most of the time I observed involved with grotesque elements, I still doubt whether do I want ‘dark’ elements in my movie, although, as mentioned from Tim Burton, those elements might be helpful in bridging the story into reality. For me, I’m more into stories that are heartwarming and humane.

source: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2012/oct/07/tim-burton-frankenweenie-interview

What impact has he had on his field? e.g. who and/or what has been influenced by his and/or his work? (other practitioners, paradigms, social movements, innovations, techniques, laws, films, music etc.)

The fashion industry could be said to have influence from him. According to the article shared below, his aesthetics has passed on to professionals from a celebrity stylist to a jewellery designer. It was about the proportion of his design of his fictional characters from his drawings and films and also about the darkness.

source: https://www.ft.com/content/14190bae-d568-11de-81ee-00144feabdc0

How would you describe his work? Does his work relate to your practice/areas of interest? If so how?

I have seen not so much of his works, but mostly I remembered it through its Gothic style. I particularly love Frankenweenie because of the juxtaposition between cuteness and darkness of the characters and settings. I also like the rhythm of the storyline that fluctuate between serious drama and humorous or sometimes nonsensical comedy. I think I could relate my work to his in terms of conveying serious issue through light-hearted storytelling.

What do you think about his work? Do you like it? Why/why not? Do you think he achieved what he set out to? Why? Why not? Do you have any criticism of his work? i.e. do you think they could be better/more successful in achieving their goals/aims/objectives? If so, how?

For Frankenweenie, I really like the work, I questioned however what if the characters are designed in a less stereotypical and appealing way, what would the film be like. I question this in order to know whether do films play a role in enforcing such repetitive appearances in characters for the audiences or not, so as to possibly open up more acceptance towards more diverse appearances of character design.