Blitzkreig of Work. Dan C

Vito Acconci – theme song

Our preview in class of this piece was actually the second time I had seen it. However, the seperate viewings left entirely different impressions on me. The first time I saw it was with an earlier media course and it was played in its entirety. The only context for the piece was essentially that Acconci was an artist and an explanation of the type of equipment he was using. In our class it was explained that he was actually playing popular songs from the period this was set and originally shown in, which I did not previously know. The first viewing ended up mixing feelings of anxiety with his calculated movements along with impatience at the pace of the surprisingly long video. The second time I viewed it these elements were still there, but they were not at the forefront now that I had a new context for the video and] control of watching it instead of having to sit down and take it. Essentially for me this piece helped display the very different meanings created by context that the creator may have no control over.

Semitotics of the Kitchen

This video is interesting to me in how its cultural moment has passed. Julia Child’s influence on modern adult women has nearly disappeared and even the target audience of “house-wives” that she appealed to has changed and dispersed in a variety of ways. So we are shown a video that is almost a relic of the early days of the feminist movement that portrays a young woman pretending to use cooking utensils with a surprising amount of aggression. The anger that is shown in her movements does make the viewer empathize with her sentiments but as it is so far removed from the moment it is impossible to avoid the absurdist humor of the video as well. The academic nature of the language and metaphors used also makes me wonder if this video was only circulated around academics who had already been exposed to this rhetoric or was it ever viewed by a slightly wider audience, and if so how was it received? Looking at modern day comments of the YouTube upload of the video (always a treacherous affair) there was about 3 pages of people arguing over who “got” it.

Jova’s Final

My favorite part of the video was the way it was able to capture the whole energy of what was happening around Hampshire. Having footage of the walk out, as well as hearing chanting in the background, both helped but then even in the other shots that energy still persisted throughout the video. This was conveyed well by your use of talking to people about their emotion and their reasons for being involved, instead of just the logistics of what was happening. There were a couple of things that just seemed like technical hiccups and they didn’t detract at all from overall good work.

Julio’s Final

It really helped to have the context of this video and worked really well within it. I basically got a realty good sense of “Alright, we’re gonna sit down and make music and its gonna be pretty sweet” and then doing it. The flow of starting working on it and then really getting into it as the video progressed was captured really well. The editing helped that go together, even though when I first saw the special effects at the end I wasn’t really for them. After your explanation though they made a lot more sense and seemed appropriate to me. Good times.