lecture monday May 9, 2011

Today's lecture was about narratives. It was really interesting to see different ways to convey narratives. From photographs to comics to movies. I thought it was very interesting how David Antin defined what was needed in a piece of work to be considered a narrative. One there needs to be a character that is faced with the possibility of transformation or change. The character must be wanting to seek this transformation out and it creates a desire. 

Duane Michals photographs were amazing. He did serious narratives with light and funny narratives. Both were executed beautifully within each frame. The one that had the most impact on me was the photographed entitled "Death Comes to the Old Lady". It was dark and beautiful at the same time. It reminded me of creep scary ghost movies. I also really like how he writes on the photographs as well. Writing makes it more personal. 

The movie we watched "La Jetee" by Chris Marker was so interesting. I really enjoyed it and I liked that is was frame shots compiled together to tell the narrative. After watching this I instently thought of all the movies that took Marker's idea and with technology adapted it more with special affects. Yet I find Marker's story so much more interesting. Simple yet captivating. One of the movies I thought about and could see how the writer would be inspired by Marker's film was the movie Inception. However I think Marker might have been inspired by the book the "Time Machine" by H.G. Wells.