CELLAR DOOR

CELLAR DOOR
''In phonaesthetics, the English compound noun cellar door has been cited as an example of a word or phrase which is beautiful purely in terms of its sound (euphony), without regard for semantics (i.e., meaning).'' (Wikipedia)

This project was about curating for me and often is when it comes to filmmaking. Basically using my own material and pushing it into a new form. I wanted to turn a bunch of random photos that I held dearly into the piece of art that resonated the overall feeling I felt off of them. This feeling was heavily influenced by the time in my life in which they were captured. This was a semi melancholy feeling of not knowing what to focus on and having little direction. This was also being felt even with a great home life and education opportunities that paved the way of questioning and formally firing up some creativity.

The title is a reference to the film Donnie Darko, of course how else would someone know about such a poetic phrase, Cellar doors is a scene in which the teacher tries to engage the clases mindfulness by explaining the the phrase Cellar Door. This kind of teacher eventually leads her teaching into unemployment. This really show a degrees of contemporary British state school education. Almost stale and in no way thought provoking or inactive. The actual definition of Cellar door fitted with my understanding, that at the time was being developed, of how photographs are instances. This instance may be a certain fraction of a second and amount of light but is nonetheless an instance of time. The whole idea of Cellar Door rolled out to this. If photography, or any imagery, is light it can not have any sound. Now your will have to bare with me here. If you were to say out loud 'photographs are instances', this to me was the sound. The sound of saying; 'This photograph is an instance'. To myself this very action is crux of all Artwork. The sound that is said. In short the instance, either the instance of the whole film or the each instance of each slide, is what purely is beautiful for how it sounds in your head. So I recognize firstly how it is an instance of time and then go on to see what content is actually in the frame. Buildings that are made with intent and purpose, people using them or walking by them, expressions and body language. Things that I had seen but after seeing again again, captured from my own action, I felt them repurpose. With this idea of Cella Door the buildings and people didn't matter any more to the Art. It was just forms for the Art to be situated into. The remix track of King Kurle had the right feel to blend them together and the context of the music is very london based, so naturally has a cityscape feeling to it. The voice over is of course Jim Mission talking about the status quo, in which I felt I was in at the time.

'With 2 negative rolls, dating back to 2012, this video was created in 2014 with Word Powerpoint, supplied by Sussex Downs Park College and published on disc. Original files lost so never got correct the major typo 'collection a photography'. Hope to re make this film with original soundtrack and Hi-res neg scans. One photo has been sold and right are reserved to them.'

Sound Track Credit, King Krule, Jim Morrison