Black Pencil on Paper / 9x9' / 2014
A Collaboration between Brent Noel Eviston & Steven Vander Meer / 2014
Kinetic Convergences explores how information and experience are edited and altered by the filters through which they are viewed. A rotating wheel of 17 drawings is viewed through a sequence of 9 shapes, each shape rotating and morphing into the next. The effect is like a constantly changing view being spied through a shape-shifting keyhole. The resulting animation is akin to a visual mantra or a moving mandala.
During the eight-and-a-half minute film each of the 17 drawings is viewed through each of the 9 keyhole shapes a single time yielding 153 unique keyhole/view combinations. The viewer is invited to contemplate how the shape of the keyhole alters the meaning and experience of the drawing viewed through it and vice versa.
The viewing experience of this short film can be active or passive. The animation can be paused so the keyhole and view relationships can be analyzed, or it can be treated as a fixed gaze meditation, wherein the constantly changing form is watched like a flame. The meditative experience of the animation can be enhanced by the synchronizing of one's breath with the shape-shifting image, inhaling for one complete three-and-a-half second transformation and exhaling during the next.
Notes on the Score: Contrapuntal Convergences / Composed and Performed by Brent Noel Eviston
A three-and-a-half second motif has been composed for each keyhole and each view. These motifs combine along with their corresponding images on screen to create 153 unique three and a half second musical pairings. Like the keyholes and views, each motif remains distinct, heralding it’s related image but played in conjunction with a second motif that alters and enhances the mood and meaning of both.
For more information on Steven Vander Meer, an award winning animator and Eviston's collaborator for this project, please visit his website at www.meerimage.com.