The Wednesday Lecture Wednesday 10th February 2021
Willow Fisher
Kiera Greene I would describe as being a very pronounced visual artist, she commented that she conventionally will create one piece of work a year. These works vary in their duration, ranging from video works lasting from five minutes to twenty. She presented to us her nine minute film called “Grain”, and describes the motif of its intended viewing to be in a cinematic environment, with the focus on the sound from the artist. This type of atmosphere is best for viewing in order to receive a better, more immersive experience, so she recommended that we wear headphones to fully engage with the visual piece. Her subject matter in this film was a woman called Anna Halprin and her daughter, Greene interviewed them both, the film presents the 90’s dancer’s life story verbally. Composing the diegetic dialogue of the interview overlapping imagery that complement what is being said. The film featured a combination of images and videos to visually re-create this environment that Anna and her daughter experienced as they are describing it. The impact of Kiera doing this is she is enabling us the audience to experience what is being discussed, furthermore engaging us with the subject matter and themes, she is unconsciously providing us with an insight into the two dancers' experience in depth. On screen we are shown old photographs of Anna performing, again complementing the dialogue from the interview. Also the artist took her own primary photos of the dance deck, she commented that she wanted to capture the history of it, she took a few photos close up of the surface. Providing us with a more intimate and personal view of the dance deck and reflecting its history, (attention to crack, grooves, and discolouration) reveal more about the experience. Kiera explained that she wanted to build a narrative using the dance deck to use it to structure the family story. Topics conveyed in this video from Anna are her life, her career and developments in dance, which all the more inspire this artist and her artistic practice. Anna revealed that she has been dancing ever since she could walk and that it came naturally to her. As well as dancing she worked as a performance artist for various performance pieces. The place that her and other artists and dancers practiced was in LA, she described it as a space for all initiative work, being broad in creativity and individuals imagination. I find the construction of Kiera’s film “Grain” really intuitive and inspiring. I admire the narrative told the way it has been with the consideration of the imagery. It has a positive tone and is relaying the information to the viewer into a format that is clear to understand. She hasn't overwhelmed the audience with exaggerated visuals and reliance on incidental non diegetic music, instead she has taken a more minimalistic approach to providing the interview and mise en scene that complements the narrative, she is contextualising it effortlessly and successfully.
The main theme of exploration for Anna Halprin in her past dance experience was the human body’s potential movement, experimenting with bodies and the movement of bodies, she uses the word experimental to describe the dance experience. She comments that working in the natural environment taught her and other creative individuals something about their own senses. For example, the wind was like breathing, and the clouds passing past the sun was similar to shadow and light movement. There was a lot of room for dancers and performers' own artistic expression, Anna suggests there was opportunity for freedom and the environment conveyed a flexible structure, which she appreciated a lot. Her interest in nature began from a young age and since then has had this fascination with its exploration, she has become accustomed to the idea that physical things come and go, evident in nature, and apparent when discussing our bodies. The daughter of Anna stated that her main belief was recognising the human body as an instrument.
Kiera is currently working on an installation piece called “Folds” and for this she is collaborating with a performance artist. She informs us that she has always had a keen interest in performance pieces but since her interaction with retired dancer Anna she's become even more entranced with working with dancers. Her interaction with Haplin has inspired her massively and has evidently impacted her creative practice. The artist stated that she finds the aspect of the relationship between the interior and exterior of our bodies interesting, indicating that representation appeals to her most of all. The way she approaches this is she makes representing individuals experiences with her camera her focal point. She strongly believes that there is a cinematic experience felt when working with movement and that they furthermore have a relationship with that sense in a lot of her work. Fascination is felt towards the subtlety of the human body and concerns herself with looking at what gestures communicate and exploring relationships to other organic structures. The elements that are appropriate from the inner and outer qualities influence her and a lot of her work. An area in which she can substitute this is in the studio, she recognises the studio as being a controlled environment, whereas on the other hand working outdoors you are working with all the elements of the weather. These generate different outcomes of the work with the different strategies running alongside. Kiera feels that her films allow her to connect, informing us of her belief that the physicality of the body and the landscape both capture the history and are most prominent in her work.
In terms of what I have learnt from this artist I can say that I now have a better understanding of the quantity of work. For example she has shown me that you don't have to produce a piece of work that is dense and loud, that if you take the simpler approach and execute it well it has the same effect. It has made me consider quality and quantity in a broader perspective. I feel a sense of familiarity watching her film “Grain”, I found the simplicity of its structure most appealing and its relatively stable pace. It was informative as well as being visually pleasant, she hadn't tried to overcompensate with exaggeration of forced creativity, I just viewed it as a natural film. Because of my response to the film I do feel positively towards the artist making me appreciate their practice and preferred style, like I said before it isn't forcing all of these narratives together to create a complex film it's just complementary and easing. Therefore I found this Wednesday guest lecture compelling and valuable for my own practice.