WEEK 1- Nathalie Djurberg's 'Claymations'.
Nathalie Djurberg's 'Claymations'.
Swedish artist Nathalie Djurberg's intricately constructed claymation films are both terrifyingly disturbing and artlessly sweet.The new works created for the Venice Biennale explore a surrealistic Garden of Eden in which all that is natural goes awry.She exposes the innate fear of what is not understood and confronts viewers with the complexity of emotions.Nathalie Djurberg was awarded the silver lion for a promising young artist at the Venice
Art Biennale 09.
(http://www.designboom.com/weblog/cat/10/view/6886/nathalie-djurberg)
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| 'Experiment' (2009) Venice Biennale |
1. What do you
understand by the word 'claymation'?
Clay Animation, is a form of stop motion
animation. Each object is sculpted in clay or a similar material, it is placed
on the desired set, a film frame is exposed and then the object is moved
slightly by hand, another frame is taken and then it is moved again. This
creates the motion we then see later in the film. When played back at a frame rate greater than 10–12
frames per second.
2. What is meant by
the term 'surrealistic Garden of Eden'? and 'all that is natural goes awry'?
Surrealism is defined as, ‘Surrealist
art is dedicated to expressing the imagination as revealed in dreams, free of the
conscious control of reason and convention.’ So in relation to Djurbergs
‘Garden of Eden’ it is obvious to the viewer that she has created quite a ‘dream’
like scenario, almost like a nightmare. She has made ‘the garden of Eden’ which
is generally seen as a ‘peaceful’ and ‘serine’ picture, very harsh and dark. It
is a very blunt comparison. The Garden is covered in creepy flowers, they are
so big they make the viewer feel almost intimidated by their size. Their
colours and shapes are nauseating.
"a strange dreamlike atmosphere".
From research on Djurberg's work I have found that her work is very colourful.
This relates back to the term " surrealistic Garden of Eden".
Awry is defined as with a slant or twist
to one side; askew, away from the appropriate or right course; amiss. Djurbergs work is
very unusual and she has used something very natural and turned it into
something very fake looking and quirky.
3. What are the
'complexity of emotions' that Djurberg confronts us with?
Djurbergs work in particular confronts the
audience with very contradicting emotions. The colours and the flowers
throughout make you feel happy, even the though the size dwarfs the initional
Audience, it has a somewhat exciting and intriguing effect. These feelings in
comparison to the ones felt when seeing the plasticine woman being deformed and
torn by the plasticine men are totally different. It is shocking and quite distressful.
4. How does Djurberg
play with the ideas of children's stories, and innocence in some of her work?
Djurberg plays with the ideas of
traditional children storylines, but adds her own twist on them, almost taking
the innocence out of them and adding a slight sense of humour.
5. There is a current
fascination by some designers with turning the innocent and sweet into
something disturbing. Why do you think this has come about?
I think this has come from the
realization that things aren’t always what they seem. There are a lot of things
in the world that may seem to be sweet and innocent but when you look deeper
they may in fact be the complete opposite. This is where the disturbing part
comes in, it’s like the hidden monsters almost, and the sweetness is a cover
from what they really are. The media defiantly has a huge impact on this
subject by the way they make people out to be, also just general society. We
live in such a materialistic world, where we don’t tend to look deeper than the
outward appearance or perhaps the first ‘layer’ of a person. I think designers
have delved into this idea, as it is opening the eyes of people to really look
deeper.
6 . In your opinion, why
do you think Djurberg's work is so interesting that it was chosen for the
Venice Biennale?
I firstly find her work
so fascinating just by the type of media used, it is very unique and quite a
nesh area of design. I enjoy the way she takes the plots of children’s stories
and plays with them to create something quite different.
