Cellar

Control and chaos

I find that my work always returns to the same place. I am highly interested in the idea of inner selves. There is an external person, and layers upon layers of internal persons, all combining to create the sense of ‘you.’ My video focuses on that deepest level. Within everyone is their darkness, panic, and anger. In life, this can seep into everyday life, causing mental distress, anxiety, and depression. The inner chaos this deepest person causes can be overwhelming, and yet it is also innate to all people to have some kind of monster living in their cellar. That darkness may be consuming their life, and yet because of the disconnect between internal and external people, no help is given because no external problem is seen. It’s the idea of going along with your nature. Fighting against your nature causes complete misunderstanding of it. It may seem like someone has control over their life and personhood, but they are very quickly crumbling apart on the inside. This a project that draws from personal experience in this area, though that experience is in the past.

In editing, it was important to discern the level of clarity, intensity, and pacing of the scene. From the beginning, it was clear that the chaos in a circle was going to be the center of attention. However, the lines he yells are improvised, jumbled up, and distorted, for the most part. This means that choosing what lines were clearly discernible and what were distorted beyond clarity had to be meticulously done so as to not push the viewer away too far. Furthermore, a chaotic setting like this needed rules. So, the bounds of the circular frame are never broken, though the circle does grow and shrink, and the distortion only occurs when the light is flashing. This creates a continuity that gives order to the madness. The sound beyond words was very important here too. I used the song “Dark Space Low” by Angelo Badalamenti from the Twin Peaks soundtrack here which perfectly gives music to the sadness on screen.

I also should give credit for the performance by my main actor, Aristotle Johns.

When I was working on my video about art, fear, and how it connects to a motivational rapper, I decided to see what would happen if I projected this video onto a painting I was working on, producing the first Projection Painting, which you can read more about on its own page here.