Tag Archives: Doug Aitken

Ravels in Review and GOODBYE

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Click “Se Flimklippet” to see another video I made, that you can make too! The ModernaMuseet, or Modern Museum, in Stockholm has a fun program that lets you create videos on your keyboard, and then they are posted at the museum during an upcoming exhibition.

I said another video earlier because, as you might have seen, this week was the premiere of another Ravels In Motion production, of a recent visit to Chelsea to see painter Anne Neely’s latest works. I think they’re well-worth seeing if you have the chance. (Both my videos and her works.

For more great art, check out Melissa Meyer’s dancing paintings and some intersting examples of what can be done in clay. If you feel a little tired of life during these dreary March days, see Doug Aitken’s Sleepwalkers film and read about how it was installed at MoMA.

In addition to the good times, we’ve also had some disappointing times here during our ravels, and this week proved to be full of them. Not only was favorite author Milan Kundera shown to be a communist sell out and Shakespeare unattractive, but Alessandro Twombly showed some works recently that are distrubingly similar to his father’s, painter Cy Twombly.

All these disaapointments in one week were too much for me! So goodbye, dear reader, and farewell!

I’m going to go drown my sorrows in the Costa Rican surf and chilly cervecas. (Because if you have to drown your sorrows, Costa Rica is the place to do it, no?) But fear not for I shall return to you in good time, specifically, April 6. Adios!

Sleepwalkers..Doug Aitken, Tilda Swinton, Myself.

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You know, typical Saturday night. I had some wine, and somehow that left me up at 4:27 AM remembering the film Doug Aitken did on the walls of MoMA the winter of 2007. (Hint: it was cool.)


The actors, such as Tilda Swinton and Chan Marshall of Cat Power, are cool. Screening your film on the huge walls of MoMA is cool. Waiting in the cold as snow starts falling to see how the different characters wake up, just for a short time, out of the comatose of their lives was also pretty cool. (Read: I am cool.)

So somehow when up at this time my thoughts drift to Sleepwalkers. I still remember how neat the experience of watching it was. The narrative played out on the city streets, with people hustling by or starting to look. Different parts of the film were shown on different walls, so the viewer had to walk around MoMA to see what other parts of the narrative.

This is a longer clip that gives you a better feel for the pacing and experience of watching at MoMA. The viewing process was fragmented, so you could never see anything at once and had to put it together in your head. Aitken says of the structure of the film that “the narratives interlock in a kinetic synchronicity and expand and break apart again. It’s almost like chaos theory.” Aitken, by the way, has also made videos for Fatboy Slim and Interpol.

So with that I leave you, well-rested reader, and may you all have a happy, bright Sunday morning. Enjoy your coffee and your blogs.

I will be sleeping.