The brief really excited me, I loved the idea of interaction with film. I’d previously watched some of the films listed before such as “The Perverts guide to ideology”, “hypernormalisation”, “La Jetee” and a few of Agnes Varda’s films, so I had a grasp of what an essay film was. They are often quite experimental in terms of imagery and cinematography as well as having that theory or type of narrative attached. Seeing the list of tutor suggested films made me really excited, I wanted to watch all of them. Some had appeared as references given to me by tutors last year such as Hito Seyrel, so I was excited to learn more. I wanted to chose a film that might lead me to a slightly different working area. I explored the post-digital a lot last year and have recognised it’s a big part of my position. I want to now see how this position can interact with other areas, such as literature and publication.
My first thoughts went to a text I read last year by Walter Benjamin – “The Task of the Translator” which conveyed the subjectivity and individuality of the act of translation – “The most important task of the translator is to create an echo or reverberation of the original. Benjamin points out that sense in a poetic work is not limited to meaning but also embraces the connotations of words.”
I had some feedback last year that I need to work with art direction more. I wanted to use this brief to push this.
I thought of some initial research points:
John Berger – article
Sophie Collins “currently and emotion”
- “Intersemiotic” – translating between mediums
Richard Hamilton – the Bride stripped bare translation
Film essay definition
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/aug/03/rise-essay-film-bfi-season
Hans Richter’s essay ‘Der Filmessay: Eine neue Form des Dokumentarfilms’,
The Information Machine
I then went through the list of films using process of elimination to see which ones interested me both stylistically and through the content.
I then condensed the films list, I went through the list and then put some more definite choices in bold. Below is an exerpt:
Jem Cohen,Lost Book Found(1996)
Harun Farocki,Parallel I–IV (2012–2014)
Morgan Fisher,Standard Gauge (1984)
Sky Hopinka, Dislocation Blues(2017)
Grant Gee,Patience (After Sebald)(2011)
Peter Greenaway, Rembrandt’s J’Accuse(2008)
Patience (After Sebald)
Jodie Mack, The Grand Bizarre(2018)
Helen Marten, Dust and Piranhas(2011)
Hito Steyerl, v (2013)
Martine Syms, A Pilot for a Show About Nowhere(2015)
Martine Syms: A Pilot for a Show About Nowhere
Sans soleil
During the meeting brief I took notes on resources and advice on how to approach the brief.
STEPS:
Pick an essay-film
Transcribe the film (in its entirety)
Watch multiple times
Analyse interpret, research
Research: when was it made, where was it made, who was it made by
How and where was it released – wide or limited, who funded
Small details are important – speak to the context – tell us how and why it is made
CONSIDER:
How text is written, formatted, structured
Flim much like book is a temporal device – exists on a time frame,
John Latham – describe book as having different temporal structures:
- The time which the book exists in
- Time it takes you to read the book
- Time within the book (time setting of the book)
Flow pacing, sequencing of a book, how many images do you include on a page, relation between text and image, how many pages slim of big, are they able to hold or do they have to place on the table
Test test test, experiment, experiment, experiment – try everything out don’t settle on the first thing
Resources:
Ubu web
Kanopy
Video Data Bank
Learning on screen BOB
INternet Archive
BFI Player
Afterall Books One Work Series
I chose my film “Patience After Sebald” by Grant Gee. Having read of the book the film has been talked about and it’s themes of translation, I thought it would be an interesting thinking point. There was the idea that I was transalting from book to film to book again in a way. I also liked how the author Max Sebald despite knowing English got the book to be translated externally to add a layer of miscommunication. The books focuses on themes of isolation and is a pioneer of the field of psycho-geography. Grant Gee’s film features artists and writers such as Tacita Dean and Robert Robert Macfarlane, some people whose work I really enjoy, talking about the themes of the book and the impact on the author who died shortly after writing “The Rings of Saturn”. Below is some initial research before I went on to watch the film.
Kingston library links:
https://doaj.org/article/42a990c74c6b4b52bd16d0ad990db284
https://academic-oup-com.ezproxy.kingston.ac.uk/adaptation/article/10/3/369/4107391
Further research:
Youtube vid of the walk:
How Sebald speaks:
I will need to think how cinematic techniques could translate into a publication – how pull outs and slow cuts etc could be reflected in layout and paper stock.
Publication research:
https://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibition/architecture-environment-eco-visionaries
Carolina Caycedo,
Serpent River Book (foreground)..
Installation view, Eco-Visionaries: Confronting a planet in a state of emergency, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 23 November 2019 — 23 February 2020. Photo: © Royal Academy of Arts, London / David Parry.
Patience After Sebald notes:
Pilgrimage itinerary maps:
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/652546
Context research, film criticism:
Patience (After Sebald): the synchronicity of words and images
https://gerryco23.wordpress.com/2012/02/23/patience-after-sebald/
Mapping out patience
Silkworm visual research
https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlehtml/2017/ra/c7ra00433h
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsif.2011.0887
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/feb/10/art.art
Group:
Guy, Ruby and Beth. I have never previously worked with Ruby and Beth keen to work with people I haven’t worked with before, shared by Beth led us to create a group with Guy and Ruby. This had a practical advantage as well because Guy and I live together and could work together more efficiently when we got to the group exhibition stage of the project.
Publication working doc:
Patience After Sebald Choice:
I thought it was a film that dealt with the idea of translation already – from book to film, multilayered translation, stimulating challenge using both the original source material the essay film is based on and the film itself. I love literature and have heard people hold Sebald in high regard so I thought it would be a good way to become familiar with the author.
Robert Macfarlane, Tacita Dean writer and artists whose work I really enjoy and the idea of creating links between such creatives was really gripping to me (which was slightly misleading as the documentary didn’t really have this type of discussion.)
Translation was key to the text – found out that despite knowing English Sebald chose to use an external translator to translate from German to English to add a layer of distortion
publication history interesting. Sebald uses lots of imagery, english publications weren’t true to his original placement etc – opportunity to re-address this graphic fault with more consciousness.
I chose my film “Patience After Sebald” by Grant Gee. Having read of the book the film has been talked about and it’s themes of translation, I thought it would be an interesting thinking point. There was the idea that I was transalting from book to film to book again in a way. I also liked how the author Max Sebald despite knowing English got the book to be translated externally to add a layer of miscommunication. The books focuses on themes of isolation and is a pioneer of the field of psycho-geography. Grant Gee’s film features artists and writers such as Tacita Dean and Robert Robert Macfarlane, some people whose work I really enjoy, talking about the themes of the book and the impact on the author who died shortly after writing “The Rings of Saturn”. Below is some initial research before I went on to watch the film.
Process of transcription:
After watching the film twice once in my initial stage of choosing a film and again beginning to think more in depth about the actual translation. I went about transcribing the film. This was a lengthy film but proved valuable and gave me a greater knowledge of the sequence of the film. The film is about 1 hour and 20 minutes long filled mainly with uninterrupted inteviews.
This is where I started to begin an understanding that the film whilst using lots of the scenery of Sebalds famous walk seems really detached from the meaning of the book which explores themes of solitude and the way Sebald creates complex links in his head.
When thinking about my translation I was thinking about the challenge of making each voice independent a route which I later stopped pursing but I wanted to see if I could use the type setting of each persons speaking to isolate the voice and get more into Sebald’s text.
This took a while and after finishing it I was keen to start creating some visuals ( a usual working method for me). Whilst transcribing I was thinking about graphic translations so I already had some ideas I could quickly explore.
Alongside transcribing I got the Harvill press edition of the rings of Saturn. To me the essay film was really a shadow of the book, intended to be watched with a prior reading to take the most from it.
Initial Visuals:
Inital idea – working a Sebaldian link into the graphic system of the publication, something that seems detached but reveals itself to be abstractly connected in a multitude of ways. System as talked about in the documentary – artists who respond to Sebalds work by making maps.
Idea of reflecting pilgrimage journey – somewhat too literal in the end one of my criticisms of the film didn’t delve so much into the sensitivity of Sebald’s trains of thought. Developed my publication as a piece of criticism.
Pilgrimage itinerary map as a graphic format – slightly too ancient
graphic system inspired by the the geometries aspect of silk, if there was anything I could attack to like the pattern that silk worms produce silk in, if that could relate to a Graphic grid.
Inspired by the way the essay film used scans of the book I began to look a visual layering, layering pages of the book with corresponding stills of the essay film. I knew I could do this quickly but wanted to create in an analogue fashion. I wanted to create in analogue ways amidst digital learning and taking in lots of information digitally due to covid I strived to embrace analogue working methods which could then be digitised.
This prompted me to experiment with a ink jet printer using acetate prints. This gave the layering a more authentic look and I think the presence of the analouge – how we can see the subtle effects of the layering such as the clarity produced by the acetate. This also conincided with how Sebald actually made a lot of the imagery for the Rings of Saturn by photo copying images over and over again to degrade them
Thom talk:
Our exhibition group had a talk with Tom, I got some really useful feedback from him, he had read The Rings of Saturn so could discuss aspects of the book I was picking on with me.
We talked about portraying the idea of silence, Sebald memories of the past and the practice as rejuvenated by Sebald of Psycho-geography. How he mixes the notion of place, the past and the present and what he sees is horrific. Suggested looking into cartography – my own transcription taking days was almost like a pilgrimage maybe my role as the translator could inform my publication.
Talked about how the books balances text and imagery. How does the voice of Sebald come through
Strong idea with acetate slides working with sequence of essay film next to book original source material – encouraged by Tom and team to keep going with this – effective.
Time line:
after being given the advice to keep going I wanted to visualise the timeline of the essay film to better correlate it with the book.
Responding to the book
then dissected the Graphic format of the book – layout, text, image placement, columns, size, stock…
As I was working closely with the book I wanted to interrogate its graphic system. The Rings of Saturn is set in an interesting way with its heavy use of images and blocky type setting.
This exercise was somewhat in response to:
*essay German English example, Unjustified text
In the German edition set in Baskerville, couldn’t find the exact font in the english one, used similar “Alygera”
tried with different weights of the font
As the images are a big part of Sebald’s work tried to understand the system – standard sizes, size of border etc. This was to become an important part of my project.
I wondered then if I could comment on the system by having it degrade over the course of the publication. I attached this idea of erosion to the East so present in the book to the Graphic system and thought how the columns of text could visually erode like the coastline walked by Sebald.
This is when I came to the idea of using the length of the book The Rings of Saturn to inform my publication. The book took me 5 hours, 36 minutes to read where as the films run time is 1 hour 20 minutes. I thought the film translation publication could represent this putting it at about a 1/5th of the length of the book. This meant the book would be 87 pages long, which was enough to set all my type how I wanted as well.
working within the preset grid of the Rings of Saturn taking into account gutters and margins, I calculated how the columns could “erode” across the page in an even way. This system would then interact with typesetting and layout conventions. I would explore this idea of having a system disrupt the text again when I looked at how the images could interact with the text.
Matthew talk
At this stage our group had a talk with Matthew, who was also familiar with Sebald’s work.
We started talking as a group about presentation methods and how to represent the digital in a physical format which we explored more in-depth later on.
Critiqued my visual on type setting and said how Sebald uses tight columns and by writing out the speaker’s name in full it breaks this up too much, he recommended I use abbreviated initials of the author and then have a list of names at the front of the publication. This also helped in making the voices seem more isolated against one another.
knew about the German publication – originally set in Baskerville, could set Sebald’s voice in Baskerville. Way to differentiate where quotes from The Rings of Saturn are used.
Outcome
After development and feedback I had a clear graphic system I wanted to use to create my publication. I started with type setting and creating my columns. Setting my document to be the size of the publication and accounting for a gutter that would work with my eroding text so it wouldn’t disappear,
After this I thought more about to how to link my images. Following conventions of the book and strengthening the link between The Rings of Saturn and my translation publication of Patience After Sebald I decide to use the exact image placement of the book corresponding with pages 1- 87. This meant that sometimes images interrupted the text which I thought was an interesting system to explore and align with the idea of objective chance as outlined by Tacita Dean when talking about Sebald’s work. Imagery was really important to Sebald’s original communication and the essay film provides all the imagery of the walk. To choose which images I used I went back to my timeline of Patience after Sebald and then corresponded where the image was in the film to where it was in Sebald’s book. Whilst this was a system it still required a bit of design choice to choose between pictures as there were so many screen shots. Whilst I thought the commentary took a way slightly from Sebalds original message the imagery of the locations where he walked was really striking in Patience After Sebald. I wanted to let this speak.
I looked to use commercial paper back binding methods but visualise the deconstruction of them in my binding method. Creating 5 signatures and used saddle stitching to bind them together. I intend on going to the book binding workshop to properly glue and trim my book.
To make my cover I used the idea of my acetate layering and layered the title of the film on top of the cover of “The Rings of Saturn” and used a image degrading technique as Sebald used by re photocopying images over and over to merge and blend the two. I set it in black and white to reflect the black and white imagery of the film.
Exhibition project:
Guy and I looked into using Cargo a website building service. All of us did physical publications with the size and scale of the books informing the communication. Guy was looking at newspaper sizes while Ruby was using match day football programmes. We wanted to preserve the physicality within the digital.
We opted then for a simplistic exhibition front page where the four publications to scale of their original size compared to one another sat on a grey background. You could interact with the digital publications by dragging them and stacking them on top of one another. When you clicked each one it took you to a feature page.
On each of our pages we listed the size of the publication and paper weight. Guy also created an icon in the top left corner which would act as the home button. He did this by making 3d models to the scale and animating them to move so you’d be able to see the depth of them. We made it so the order of the shapes matched the order the publications were on the splash page so a viewer could make this link easier.
On my own page I had a digital slideshow version of my publication but to access it you had to drag “The Rings of Saturn” out of the way showing that my publication was an echo of the book and reflecting my criticism of the essay film not being true to the message of the book.
After my introduction talking briefly about the essay film I had the idea to mock up a downloadable option that would save as a pdf. However after each download the image would degrade slightly so the more and more it was downloaded, it would degrade or “erode”. I thought this was a neat way to tie in this theme and commented also on the voice of the isolated Individual as everyone’s publication would be unique.
It was great to then present this in front of our exhibition group. We were the first group so people were a bit quiet for our presentation but some great discussions began to form around seeing peoples physical responses and often digital exhibitions in tandem. Tutors then wrote up individual feedback and we got it back a few days later.
Such a stimulating first project and informed my choice of strand. Great way to do group projects, I appreciated the pacing of it having times where working independently and the converging as a group.
Cameron Aitken Graphic Design 