What is the Core Relationship Between Art and the Moving Image?

“As collage technique replaced oil paint, the cathode-ray tube will replace the canvas."

(Paik, Martin, 2006:10)

The relationship between art and film has become a prominent subject for my recent research and personal investigations. As Nam June Paik clearly points out in the quote referenced above, film can be seen as an extension of painting. “It is no longer an indexical media technology but rather, a sub-genre of painting,” as Lev Manovich, (Mulvey, 2006:20), writer and professor of new media, agrees. This is a concept that has begun to preoccupy my production of artwork, and an enquiry into the history, theory, and practice of film will be a beneficial attempt to understand my chosen discipline. A particular area of film that continuously resurfaces within my research is the British documentary movement, which developed between the 1930s and 1950s. Certainly, it was this movement that distinguished Britain’s film culture from that of Hollywood’s ‘Golden Era,’ and gave Britain such a specifically national cinematic basis. Therefore, a particular reference into the evolution of the British film industry since 1945 would be of greater relevance to my work and this essay question.

The production of moving image stems from the departure of trying to portray physical reality within painting, as well as the invention of photography and cameras. Although the abstractionists also tried to separate themselves from this ‘fake’ portrayal, the shapes and colours that existed within their works continued to exist within pictorial space. Their alternatives to this departure were collage and architecture, just as moving image became the solution to camera obscura by making the images look closer to reality. According to the German film critic, Rudolf Arnheim, moving image is able to “seize and interpret the experience from which other visual arts escape... to which they are reacting,” (Arnheim, 1977:27.) It is my understanding that a feeling of dissatisfaction with constantly trying to portray reality within the restrictions of painting that gave way to the need of an alternative. Perhaps it wasn’t a need, but the option that became available certainly opened many new possibilities at how to reproduce, represent, and replicate reality. For me a union between my previous artwork and the use of moving image proved to be an important turning point, with the frames within film offering a satisfyingly painterly projection of physical reality. Without doubt the production of a moving image, or film, needs attention to aspects such as lighting, perspective, and composition, just as much as the creation of a painting. This has been a recent revelation for me in understanding the transition of my work from 2D to moving image.

So what is the core relationship between art and the moving image?

In answering this question I need to reference back to the history and previous expansions of conventions of film. Video art only established itself as an accepted art in the 1960s, but how was film accepted and presented before this? The period between 1945 and the 1960s not only saw technical innovations, such as the inventions of video and the camcorder, which affected how reality is represented or regurgitated by film, but the rise of film as a communicative medium pre-1945 also had an important influence. The ‘Golden Age’ of cinema across the Atlantic in the USA saw a hugely popular use of narrative and fictitious type of moving image emerge, producing an attraction towards the actors of such films. In a time when war, conflict, and economic crises were not uncommon, films that helped to provide an alternative to reality and presented the people with an optimistic idealism were openly received. Romantic films, such as the 1939 box-office hit ‘Gone with The Wind’ and 1939 colourful musical ‘Wizard of Oz’ lead the way for our present continuation of narrative ‘feel-good’ films. This use of the camera as a vehicle to represent reality in a way in which we wish to see it has always been something that I have overlooked. Growing up with a constant supply of fabricated films has made me take them for granted, but when looking at films as a filmmaker it is easier to understand them as another outlet for an artistic way of thinking and interpretation of how we perceive the reality in which we live.

“The artist is a liar in the sense of favouring the ideal world over the real, the eternal over the temporal, illusion over reality... They lie, depicting life as it should be rather than as it is in order to present a version of the real that is superior to mundane realty." 

            (Dick, 2002:15-18)

So where is the problem in this? Using film to depict reality as we would like it to be only proves the power of the moving image. If I were to compare the 1870 oil painting by Ford Madox Brown depicting Romeo and Juliet's famous balcony scene, with George Cukor's multi-Oscar-nominated 1936 production of Shakespeare’s most loved tragedy, which would satisfy me in terms of experiencing the love and lust that I would want to see in the alternative realities presented? Clearly, both would explain parts of the story, but only one medium would explain it in full. The painting gives away limited reasoning behind the two figures. The film takes the viewer through many emotions and experiences within the alternative reality before we reach the conclusion of a critical judgment. Moving image is not only able to suck us into the images that are presented to us, but it is able to explain itself more fully in terms of context. In most cases we are able to draw more personal links to the representations, resulting in the evidence of the huge fan base that films generate.

On the other hand, painting “makes a subject-matter visible to us by composing it from and thereby making manifest those features (such as light and colour) which are inherent in our seeing of it and which therefore constitute the ‘premises’ of vision, but which under normal circumstances we are not explicitly aware of,”(Crowther, 1993:111). What is meant by this is that a painting can emphasize forms, objects, emotions, or even relationships in a way that makes us look at them with more attention than we would ever think to do so otherwise. Although moving image can also do this, usually a film will deal with these connotations within the contexts that they are in within our reality. They are unable to draw attention to them without unintentionally getting them lost again within the reality they are trying to reproduce.

“The painter, in other words, reaches beyond what is immediately given in vision to that generally unnoticed visual texture which sustains it. As Merleau-Ponty put it, painting ‘gives visible existence to what profane vision believes to be invisible.’”

(Crowther, 1993:111)

According to Arnheim the objects within the moving image are grouped by a balance of mathematical figures, with the size, form, and light organizing the space, which is then strung together by events of movement from shot to shot. Merleau-Ponty’s understanding of what is visible within painting is lost within the moving image, as the movement and presentation of numerous objects overcomes their visibility.
So is this an understanding that the moving image can be less truthful in representing reality compared to painting? Does painting make us look specifically at an object, drawing our attention to it in a way that films can only make us grasp at but never be fulfilled by? I believe the representation of reality through film is an additional way of looking at ourselves and our understanding of the environment that we live in. This leads me to look at the use of moving image in the production of the documentary.

“Filmmakers have been exploring (these) passages and corridors that epic poets, dramatists, and novelists had discovered. But because these passages are ‘cunning,’ filmmakers, as well as documentarists, must not fall victim to the belief that their version of the truth is the only one; it is only one of many.”

(Dick, 2002:15-18)

Documentary filmmakers are, in some ways, potentially powerful when presenting the truth. They may deal with images of our reality that can be explained and narrated for the viewer to understand the context, history, and reasoning behind the events of the images being presented, but a documentary’s appearance of reality must always be taken with a grain of salt. For example, the World War I film, ‘The Battle of the Somme,’ from 1916 by Geoffrey Malins and John McDowell, was a documentary based on the trench warfare. However, it was also a piece of propaganda. It was used to show what the British troops were going through; it brought the reality of the trenches home to Britain. Nevertheless, we now know that some of the scenes were staged so that the film could flow into a feature film. As it stands today, this film is used as historical reference as a record of the battle. The acceptance of the images presented in this way shows the different way reality can be twisted for altered meanings.

Paul Rotha, a British filmmaker, film historian, and critic, outlined a ‘plan for British Films’ in 1949. He understood that Britain had a chance to revitalize the cinema to its advantage.

“Film is art plus industry. Neither can survive without the other. The industry can commit suicide: cinema will exist as long as there is a camera and a piece of negative... making films is a creative act first and an industrial process second.”

(Rotha, 1958:289)

As a continuation from the use of documentaries during the war period, a base in ‘social realism’ became a strong uneasy feeling towards a type of artiness within British cinema. The ‘industrial process’ of using cinema to create a national theme of film came up against the Hollywood style, and successfully planted typically British films within the history of film making. A certain figure who stands out in this progression was John Grierson, who established a secure connection between film making with government funding and co-operation. However, Grierson’s production of documentary making also included using staged scenes, as was used in ‘The Battle of the Somme,’ meaning a lack of continued authenticity in the truthfulness of the films. One can argue that not all paintings include the whole truth of what the painter saw; many paintings are of staged scenes, with their still life set-ups or family portraits having been arranged by the artist beforehand. Therefore, in the case of the documentary, how far can the truth be represented through the use of a camera?

As films moved past 1945 a continuation of historical war documentaries or dramas based on fact continued their production. Conversely, a growth in the market for fictitious films overtook the British stage, with an increase in camera production, and greater attention to an already national cinema. Films such as ‘Kes,’ directed by Ken Loach in 1969, based upon the novel, ‘A Kestral for a Knave,’ by Barry Hines in 1968, is an obvious example of the British New Wave movement of the 1960s. This movement built upon the basis of documentaries, with a continuation of basing its fiction upon the social climate of Britain.
Video art broke with conventional moving image genre concepts. After the cinema had developed an accepted relationship with viewers before the 1960s, the availability of equipment to be able to experiment with film was sure to give way to a new genre. The release of Sony’s first video recorder in 1965 meant that artists, such as Nam June Paik were able to stretch the conventional limits of video art. In a way, he was the pioneer of experimentations with this medium. His use of television within installation work, such as his 1985 piece ‘Fish Flies on Sky,’ offered the view of the medium as an object, as well as a modern visual invention.

Others, such as Andy Warhol, used the medium to record their reality. In ‘Outer and Inner Space,’ from 1965, two black and white sixteen millimetre films with sound showed the style icon Edie Sedgwick in a way that was personal and a-kin to a documentary style. The split-screen projection allowed Sedgwick to be seen viewing her in one of the shots. Questioning the use of moving image to view how other people perceive us is not unlike the construction of a portrait. We are able to see ourselves with reality around us, and whether we agree with this representation is entirely our own choice when considering the likeness we connect to that of the image on the screen.
Therefore, in relation to the previously asked question, the relationship between moving image and art is the suggestion of truth, lies, and an alternative to reality. There are clear relationships that these points raise where moving image is still very much like a painting, drawing, or sculpture, in that it is still a person’s interpretation of how one sees, or wishes to see reality. Inversely there is the question that the production of film will always give the reality presented a twist; the use of a camera to capture life is not like using ones hand to draw it – it uses a mechanical object as the tool of representation. In today’s culture how many of us are Cyborgs? I have come to understand that by using even a computer to type an essay clearly makes me a cyborg. Thus, using a camera to capture reality concurs with this self evaluation. Surely it is how we use the machines to our advantage that sets us apart from the artificial organisms?

In conclusion, I now feel better equipped when understanding the creation and progression of the relationship between art and the moving image. It is clear that box-office hits are still the more popular kind of film production, with Hollywood owning a large majority of the centre stage of filmmaking. The history of the British film has introduced this concept of truth over fiction, which continues to be an important conflict for me and my work. A certain film, which has fixated my work, is ‘Robinson in Space,’ (1997) by Patrick Keiller. In this feature-length documentary style narrated film, it is clear that the images and narrated facts presented to the viewer do not completely match up. It forces you to think twice about whether you should be completely sucked into this reality, or whether you should take the images as truth and narration as lies. It is clever in the way the narration is perhaps twisted truth, so that it works round the images to make them seem questionable. It is this playful struggle of fact over fiction which excites me with this piece of film work. The single frame shots of the British towns, cities, and countryside certainly continue in the use of the British social climate as a basis, producing another typically British film.

The recognition of moving image as an extension of painting is a valid agreement that has been made by the more recent use of film and video. To view one’s existence within a painting, is the same as to view one’s existence within a film. Although a film can offer more context or explanation, a painting can pull attention to things that can be overlooked in films as well as in reality. No medium can offer the unvarnished truth of reality, and this is possibly why films, in addition to painting, always leave us with a wanting to know more; to understand all potential appearances of the world in which we live so that we can better understand ourselves and our placement within reality.


Bibliography

Books

• Arnheim, R (1977), ‘Film Essays and criticism,’ London, The University of Wisconsin Press
• Crowther, P (1993), ‘Art and Embodiment: From Aesthetics to Self-consciousness,’ Oxford
• Martin, S (2006), ‘Video Art,’ Grosenick.E (d), Germany, Tashen
• Mulvey, L (2006), ‘Death 24x a Second; Stillness and the moving Image,’ London, Reaktion Books
• Rotha, P (1958), ‘Rotha on the Film,’ London, Faber and Faber

Websites

• Ian Aitken, 2003-08, ‘Documentary: Britain’s Greatest Contribution to Cinema?’

http://www.screenonline.org.uk/film/id/446186/

Updated 21st January, 2009

• (Constructor Unknown), 1998, ‘British Documentary Movement,’

http://www.britmovie.co.uk/history/bdm~

Updated 1st February 2009

• Wikipedia, ‘The Battle of the Somme (Film)– Wikipedia- the free Encyclopedia),’

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Battle_of_the_Somme_(film)

Updated 25th November 2008
• Wikipedia, ‘John Grierson – Wikipedia- the free Encyclopedia,’

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Grierson

Updated 8th February 2009

• Wikipedia, ‘Kes (Film) – Wikipedia- the free Encyclopedia,’

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kes_(film)

Updated 29th January 2009

• Wikipedia, ‘Romeo and Juliet– Wikipedia- the free Encyclopedia,’

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romeo_and_Juliet

Updated 5th February 2009