Arias of Past Laments
One key way of utilising thought as an action for my method becomes demonstrative in how I respond to devices. The device is a powerful tool in the right hands. As well as a destructive one. If we view the device, or to be more precise, the screen, we are given a portal to another world.
Firstly, it’s important to contextualize what the ‘giveness’ of these worlds posses in a way that the real world does not. The 4 films below have been made in between various modules of the course and alongside other works in process. They can be viewed as breakaways from the more tangible works that I produce in other mediums such as ceramics and painting. These works demonstrate thinking in real-time. The results display the making process with and dependent on a functioning relationship with the apparatus that facilitates the making.
Title: Installing Extra Gravity Over That Already Suppressed (2021)
Format: 16:9
Duration: 4:44
Film link: https://www.stuleeart.com/the-gap/2021/11/27/gr74y4i1rws1jfys45mv9cnjiihdro Nb: Third video down.
'Cityscape' is a socio-political lensed video and sound installation addressing the looming pressures of central city living. In London, we anthropomorphise through the nomenclature "The City", a place that indexes and symbolises wealth, capital and status. Ever-growing and 'looming', the spectral element that quietly stands unresisted, continues to dominate not only the skyline but also politically, environmentally, financially, or socially. We are subjected to the effects of exponential capitalist "progress" beyond what is sustainable. This work embodies the geometries and structures that counter natural order, primal reckoning, and psychological understandings of contemporary living.
Chasing Thoughts Inside Their Construction (2021)
Dimensions: 884 x 492
Format: Video H.264 16:9
Chasing Thoughts Inside Their Construction (2021) is a video short exploring the act of thinking. Using still images set against moving nebulous waves, the framing and construction set out clear and defined boundaries. Within these borders, images move around each other in an awkward and rigid circular motion juxtaposed with intricate lines that constrict the flow and Rhythm. Wonder seeks to answer that which is unknown or imminent. This sets up a timeline that can extend beyond the moment yet is rooted in the physicality of the now—setting the real against the imagined, the now against the yet to be. And with a world in flux and transition, the now is more urgent than at any point in our existence. Music Credit Blond:ish © Kompact
Using social media filters as a technical support, 'I could see, that is a ball' (2021) investigates what is readily available in the current "metaverse" of social media filters and other digital aides that can assist the making process. ‘I could see, that is a ball' (2021) fuses those readily available attributes within images coupled with a narrative from a track by Roger Waters, which questions the current political and social conventions forming our life today. With this approach, the image which is transfigured from fixed optical positions, takes on its own potency when morphing into something new. This process captures my desire to find something new and innovative within my work which may then lead to a firmer practice modality.
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Film Is an important part of my practice and there is a very experimental element that I want to try and explore. For me film is about reaction in real time to what is being used as content. The imagery usually filmed on the street, but also in private places, acts as a body or material in the same way that say, clay or oil paint would be. Deciding whether to indelibly mark a work space, screen or projection on a surface, really depends not just on what is put into the edit, but also what is taken away. One key feature I like to use is a Blue/Green (see fig. a ) Are filters to ‘performative?’, do layer effects add to affect or do they get in the way of something more essential? Again this could be said about the music in each piece. The rationale for that is to play with images and timing. Yet, this is completely experimental and I am not sure this would be something I see myself relying upon as a tactic for production. I’m not sure this kind of musical appropriation suits either my style or practice. there are enough stand alone elements in the diaristic or ‘quiet’ storytelling, that work better. I set that against earlier films like year one work ‘Under One Bag’ (see fig. b, below) Where the audio was the accidental noise in the room, which happened to be the audio of the bbc news channel in the background of the room. For me these questions tie into my overall approach to making. My practice really only concerns investigations into the essential qualities of accidental properties of materialities, whether that be paint, film, clay, time, motion or aggregates. My point of arrival is usually informed by an idea which is underpinned in a philosophical framework and this approach to making as research, produces material outcomes that sometimes leave as many questions as they answer.
Fig. a, Example of Green/Blue Screen attribute. The produced effect allows the removal of digital elements to either enhance an image to produce further impactful and resonant stimuli or interfere with elements of the image below.
Fig. b Stuart Lee, Under one Bag (2019)
I have also started to film helicopters in the city. Helicopters act as evidence of a happening. Therefore, if we use C. S. Peirce’s mode of apprehending signs, we are given something else as a result of coming into contact with the helicopter. [1] This way of conceiving the object of the helicopter expands how we can gain access to the ‘withdrawn’. Using Peirce’s methodology, the helicopter acts as a “sign vehicle” [1] therefore, producing a correlate. What the sign hands over to our cognizance are now dependent on the fact that the helicopter is there. In a location that signifies a transcendent object elsewhere. Beyond the physical relations of sighting and viewership.
Fig. c Stuart Lee Helicopter Shot 2021. First clip made from my iphone.
[1] Atkin, Albert, "Peirce's Theory of Signs", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2013 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2013/entries/peirce-semiotics/>.