"Enter the Void" and "Caged Bird" by Luminosity, commentary by renenet
Title: Enter the Void
Vidder: Luminosity
Source: Enter the Void
Link to vid: LiveJournal post
Commentary by: renenet
and
Title: Caged Bird
Vidder: Luminosity
Source: Last Year at Marienbad
Link to vid: LiveJournal post
Commentary by: renenet
Luminosity's vids always fascinate me, and there was something about her 2010 VividCon Premieres vid, "Caged Bird," that I found really intriguing but couldn't entirely articulate until I started thinking about it in relation to "Enter the Void," the vid that Lum premiered in the 2011 Club Vivid dance party vidshow at VividCon. I hope you will indulge me here as I discuss them both together, hopefully identifying the elements that they share in common while at the same time distinguishing each vid's distinctive priorities.
It strikes me that both of these vids are visual/auditory meditations on three-dimensional space, incorporating everything from the geometric patterns of the observed environment to a deep exploration of the interiority and exteriority of spaces and the people in them...by the time Lum hits her groove in these vids, though, it feels like she's exploring fifth- or sixth-dimensional space somehow. Like, sure, we've all heard time described as a fourth dimension, but I'd like to add the fifth for, say, the hypnotic-but-shapely experience of the music in these vids and what it adds to the overall experience. And a couple extra dimensions to try to capture the multiple layers of three-dimensionality the vids are exploring.
In "Enter the Void" we get to explore the bright-lights cityscape:
...AND the interior spaces of rooms and dance clubs and hallways and tunnels and bedrooms:
...AND the interior spaces of the human body in extreme close up (OVUM! Ganglia? Blood vessels? IDEK!):
...AND THEY ARE ALL ON THE SAME LEVEL OF VISUAL PRESENTATION/NARRATIVE; THERE IS NO DISTINCTION. The vid weaves them together and bleeds them into and over one another:
Cling hard to your sense of perspective and your left-brain logical thinking and you can probably continue to distinguish each layer of exploration and mark it by category, but I think the vid demands that the viewer give into the EXPERIENCE and go with the flow.
It's SEX, right? It's people fucking in the LOVE hotel:
and the sperm hits the ovum and tries to enter because that's what the sperm and ovum do. And the LOVE hotel's interior designer agrees and turns it into the inspiration for a chandelier:
But in this vid all spaces lead into the void, the vagina:
(Check out this sequence of shots from either side of the 1:00 mark)
...and the camera glides and spins us in and out and around and through it to explore the totality of the act and of the human impulse, as embodied in the copulatory experience, which is everywhere and everything.*
*Or, at least, it is when some totally tripping painter imagines it all that way:
Yeah, I think there's a framing device in there, but you can take it or leave it--he's just another human being who is caught up in the experience. With pretty lights and a great groove. Apparently, some dude made what I'm guessing is a pretty self-indulgent film about this, but I have to say, I think I prefer Lum's condensed version.
So, if "Enter the Void" is the squirming-around-on-the-bed-in-a-sexual-haze version of the six-dimensional exploration of interiority and exteriority, then "Caged Bird" is, well, the caged bird exploration of it. The rigid, constrained version that just hints at the lushness of what is contained within. It does similar things with exploring the geometry of spaces--interior space of rooms and hallways and staircases:
...and exterior spaces of patterned gardens, large hedges and giant statuary:
...and minute spaces of patterned objects and human forms and echoed images all the way down/through in mirrors and photographs:
...forming them all into a meditation on place and space and mysterious, vaguely ominous relationships between the sexes.
And I'm afraid that here is where this commentary will have to end. I officially owe Luminosity a more substantive commentary on the content and meaning of "Caged Bird," which is an all around gorgeous vid that both interprets and pays homage to its source material, Last Year at Marienbad. There is much to say, and in some version of this reality I will say it. Complete with footnotes and pretending I know anything about French cinema, even. It could happen! Perhaps next year we'll meet here again...
Vidder: Luminosity
Source: Enter the Void
Link to vid: LiveJournal post
Commentary by: renenet
and
Title: Caged Bird
Vidder: Luminosity
Source: Last Year at Marienbad
Link to vid: LiveJournal post
Commentary by: renenet
Luminosity's vids always fascinate me, and there was something about her 2010 VividCon Premieres vid, "Caged Bird," that I found really intriguing but couldn't entirely articulate until I started thinking about it in relation to "Enter the Void," the vid that Lum premiered in the 2011 Club Vivid dance party vidshow at VividCon. I hope you will indulge me here as I discuss them both together, hopefully identifying the elements that they share in common while at the same time distinguishing each vid's distinctive priorities.
It strikes me that both of these vids are visual/auditory meditations on three-dimensional space, incorporating everything from the geometric patterns of the observed environment to a deep exploration of the interiority and exteriority of spaces and the people in them...by the time Lum hits her groove in these vids, though, it feels like she's exploring fifth- or sixth-dimensional space somehow. Like, sure, we've all heard time described as a fourth dimension, but I'd like to add the fifth for, say, the hypnotic-but-shapely experience of the music in these vids and what it adds to the overall experience. And a couple extra dimensions to try to capture the multiple layers of three-dimensionality the vids are exploring.
In "Enter the Void" we get to explore the bright-lights cityscape:
...AND the interior spaces of rooms and dance clubs and hallways and tunnels and bedrooms:
...AND the interior spaces of the human body in extreme close up (OVUM! Ganglia? Blood vessels? IDEK!):
...AND THEY ARE ALL ON THE SAME LEVEL OF VISUAL PRESENTATION/NARRATIVE; THERE IS NO DISTINCTION. The vid weaves them together and bleeds them into and over one another:
Cling hard to your sense of perspective and your left-brain logical thinking and you can probably continue to distinguish each layer of exploration and mark it by category, but I think the vid demands that the viewer give into the EXPERIENCE and go with the flow.
It's SEX, right? It's people fucking in the LOVE hotel:
and the sperm hits the ovum and tries to enter because that's what the sperm and ovum do. And the LOVE hotel's interior designer agrees and turns it into the inspiration for a chandelier:
But in this vid all spaces lead into the void, the vagina:
(Check out this sequence of shots from either side of the 1:00 mark)
...and the camera glides and spins us in and out and around and through it to explore the totality of the act and of the human impulse, as embodied in the copulatory experience, which is everywhere and everything.*
*Or, at least, it is when some totally tripping painter imagines it all that way:
Yeah, I think there's a framing device in there, but you can take it or leave it--he's just another human being who is caught up in the experience. With pretty lights and a great groove. Apparently, some dude made what I'm guessing is a pretty self-indulgent film about this, but I have to say, I think I prefer Lum's condensed version.
So, if "Enter the Void" is the squirming-around-on-the-bed-in-a-sexual-haze version of the six-dimensional exploration of interiority and exteriority, then "Caged Bird" is, well, the caged bird exploration of it. The rigid, constrained version that just hints at the lushness of what is contained within. It does similar things with exploring the geometry of spaces--interior space of rooms and hallways and staircases:
...and exterior spaces of patterned gardens, large hedges and giant statuary:
...and minute spaces of patterned objects and human forms and echoed images all the way down/through in mirrors and photographs:
...forming them all into a meditation on place and space and mysterious, vaguely ominous relationships between the sexes.
And I'm afraid that here is where this commentary will have to end. I officially owe Luminosity a more substantive commentary on the content and meaning of "Caged Bird," which is an all around gorgeous vid that both interprets and pays homage to its source material, Last Year at Marienbad. There is much to say, and in some version of this reality I will say it. Complete with footnotes and pretending I know anything about French cinema, even. It could happen! Perhaps next year we'll meet here again...