In some ways, stop motion animation is less rigid and meditative than a 24×24 hyperreal oil painting. Something is freeing about whimsically painting as the notion strikes. I am spending more time in the studio. Instead of cramming hours of painting into one sitting and then not painting again for a few days. I find myself painting every day.
The smaller, non-mounted paintings are painted, wiped away, and painted over in small increments. I take photos between each wipe and repaint. Then I run them through Light Room to correct any changes in light. How quickly the earth turns when you are hand painting the animation! Once I correct the exposure and flip the images (the camera is mounted upside down), I place images into Final Cut. I enjoy adding the sounds effects.
In other ways, animation is tedious, slow, and frustrating as heck. I am far too critical. I try hard to shake that criticism while remembering it is ok to fail. Failure is a good thing. If the animation is a failure, I will have lots of small sketch paintings. I am still doing what I love.
Driving at night, still from 3rd semester animation.
Remember Reflect Reform
In this work, I have been exploring phenomena of memory augmentation. I experimented with reflections and cinematic images by juxtaposing photographs, paint, wood, and mylar. The direction of the work includes painting intimate, reflective, observations of augmented memories.
I began by building a cabinet of curiosities as a way to form a tableau painting and experiment with different media. Inspired by the relief paintings by artist Sally Han, I built a model of a Victorian cabinet using tenets of Darwin's theory of evolution. I painted on a variety of surfaces including wood, photographs, and adding raw lumber to the pieces. In this process, I disassembled the cabinet to give autonomy to each piece. Although I diverted from the original idea of a final installation, there was an impulse to paint larger. Adding mylar was yet another way to accentuate reflection as a part of the critical dialogue with the work. The final result offers an opportunity to remember, reflect, and reform.
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