THE TITLE - A SHORT FILM WHERE THE TITLE IS THE TITLE

Thumbnail picture for the film "The Title" 

This multimedia project wasn't all clear from the start, but I filmed a few bits that I thought I might like to use, and added other video clips and stills as I was going along. Martin helped me with the theatrical scenes where I'm dressed in black, in a Victorian style. There must have been a thousand little bits in the end. Premiere Elements isn't really designed to cope with so many layers and general complexity. The uploaded version still has a few faults in it, but I will leave it for now and fix it later. I spent a few weeks with this project and really need to get it out there and out of my mind!

This short film is a collaged conglomerate of fragments from my own life as well as my family's history - stills, moving images, performance, a poem I wrote long ago back in 1985 - the only poem I ever wrote! In the film a part of it is performerd in the original Swedish, with the English translation overlaying the imagery. And last but not least, there are many of my handmade collages. It's packed with symbolic imagery and the narrative (a kind of journey) is really an explanation to the art work. However, as this may not be immediately obvious, this multi media show can be taken in intuitively as well. It's an emotional life story, and I hope that comes across as the main objective for this project. Ultimately, the idea behind the quote "All the World's a Stage, and Men and Women merely Players" (Shakespeare) is once more one of the main themes of my work.

Ggenerally speaking I'm leaving it to people to make their own conclusions about this work, but of course I hope, as always, that there is universal appeal as it speaks about entitlement, loss and restoring a sense of dignity. The title "The title" refers to the idea of being "entitled", either physically (health, money, and other good things in life), or emotionally (having a sense of worth, dignity and spiritual stature).

The idea of using a journey as the narrative that pulls it all together is of course not an original one, but one that makes a story easier to watch and tends to keep the audience's attention. I decided on this format because "the journey" is a deeply archetypal metaphor or "monomyth" (Joseph Campbell) that is present in all cultural traditions, speaks to everyone on at least some level, and because it helps making sense of the fragments.

I think this representation of a heroe's journey should be taken with a pinch of salt, but
it can offer some viewpoints that clarify the concept of a journey through life that
is full of hardships but also some sort of benefits and rewards.

I also used the old film effect quite a bit because it helps create a sense of the past (which is an important element in this project), as well as providing great texture. I ponder each effect quite a bit, as it needs to support the symbolism or message that I want to get across. 

I think you can't make a long film with this much symbolism, there's a point where it overwhelms the brain. Recently, we watched some older Ingmar Bergman films and I was thinking how they were always said to be deeply symbolic. I saw them when I had just entered university and loved the atmosphere and the way Swedish was spoken, but I didn't get the symbolism. Now I realised, there is hardly any there at all! In my favourite, the tender "Wild Strawberries", there's a dream sequence that has some symbolism in it, notably in the clock without hands. Sometimes the weather is moody, which is meant to enhance the melancholy in the story, but that's not really symbolism, it's just mood. Of course, as a Cancerian I can recognise another Cancerian's flair for moodiness! The empty streets... oh so de Chirico, who was also Cancerian! Strictly speaking, Bergman's strength lies in conveying mood, but not really in the use of symbols - in fact, some of his movies are actually just nonsense. Anyway, this medium allows a lot of imagery that speaks to people as if they were symbols, because the performance in 3D can convey so much in so little time with the help of props, environment, music, temporality and other attributes.

The dream sequence in Ingmar Bergman's "Wild Strawberries" ("Smultronstället")

The classical music for my film was taken from a site with copyright-free classical music, Musopen, which I can highly recommend. Youtube suggested that I had nicked some music called "Tranquillity" from someone else's album, but the performer whose piece I used has never participated in any project called "Tranquillity". My guess is that someone else also took the Baroque piece, which obviously wasn't originally called "Tranquillity", and used it on their CD! Let me guess... with added birdsong and water splash... I have therefore debated Youtube's suggestion with a clean conscience. Oh and of course, Martin did some wonders to some of the recordings that weren't really up to scratch.

And of course, I always wanted to be movie star! I remember in the distant past, that a good friend of mine said about me that I'm always quite theatrical - and she meant it as a compliment, rather than in the sense of "drama queen". I think I have an imbedded sense of the theatrical, and it feels good to get some outlet for this side of my creativity.

I would love to hear comments!

WHY USE SYMBOLS? SYMBOLISM AS A GENRE IN THE ARTS

Hugo Simberg: Wounded Angel, 1903
A Finnish Symbolist painter.
This image can, among other things, be seen as depicting the dichotomy between ideals 
connected with other worldly matters and the reality we face in our daily lives.

WHY MUCH OF MY ART IS SYMBOLIC

When I started out as an artist, the way I best felt I could express my views was through the use of universal and personal symbols. I had a desire to make every bit of my art meaningful and my messages quite specific, and so preferred to employ a symbolic language. In an image, the first and foremost mode of expression is the immediate visual impact - it defines whether you want to stay with the picture or not. I do feel, however, that once you feel intrigued by it because it makes sense to you aesthetically, it also needs to carry meaning that you can relate to. This meaning can reveal itself through a conscious analysis, or a more subconscious process. All the elements in the work obtain a semiotic quality when their subjective and objective being-in-the-world are highlighted simultaneously. There are many ways in which we understand art work, but it seems to me that conceptual art often operates on a fairly shallow level of meaning that mainly stems from rational analysis - it may be relevant as a mirror of our time, but it's also one that comes today and is gone tomorrow. It seems to me that symbols have the greatest universal appeal to humans over time. I want to express myself succinctly and symbols present themselves as the best way in which I can do so. Read more about the actual process of making symbolic art HERE. The following is a discussion about the value of symbols.

THE VALUE OF SYMBOLS

You may ask what the point in using symbolism to convey a message through art really is. Those who are familiar with art history know that Symbolism is a movement that started up with the paintings of Gustave Moreau around 1860 but was deemed useless and out of date by the beginning of the First World War. It was a movement that was mainly concerned with the other worldly, and to a surprisingly high degree was linked with Catholicism. Some symbolists were interested in esoteric world views, and wanted to convey these beliefs through their art as has traditionally been done in religious art. These artists felt that the best way of conveying their view of a more spiritual realm was through the use of symbols as it was a way of pointing towards realities that you couldn't otherwise describe. Many artists were, however, not necessarily expressing very complex truths. In simple terms, this artistic genre came about as a reaction against the industrial upswing and a wide spread interest in realistic art as social commentary. The war crushed a lot of idealism and made introspective and solipsist art seem self-indulgent - the art that followed was mostly socially orientated. 

Nothing in art history is, however, straightforward and subject to a strict chronological time line. When it comes to symbolism, it pops up here and there in various forms and for various reasons. In the modern era, artists often use symbols without making much of a point of it. You find it in all genres of art. Various forms of fantasy art are alive and well, and some of these artists of the imagination employ symbols to a very high degree. Almost anyone who is interested in investigating the deeper layers of the human psyche or spiritual visions will use symbols. The problem is that this kind of symbolism is often lacking in personality and originality. 

Symbols have always been around in the form of mythology, fairy tales, as well as esoteric and alchemical explorations. These depictions of the human condition and how humans relate to the other worldly have been informative and necessary for the evolution of the human psyche, and there is no reason to believe that this has come to an end. It may seem that cynicism and a fragmentation of spirituality is here to stay, but I don't believe it. Art that expresses such disillusion is not life-affirming and constructive, and is therefore in the long run an unsatisfactory way of dealing with life's deeper issues and the human condition. In the end, the really big questions in life are the ones that live on forever, though our interpretation, experience and way of expressing them evolves over time, becoming more informed and sophisticated.

While the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud paved the way for dream interpretation, his disciple Carl Gustav Jung made a great job in researching the deeper meaning of widely recurring symbols and archetypes. The Depth Psychology that he and others instigated is still inspiring a great many psychotherapists who are interested in the subconscious mind and importance of dreams and archetypes in people's lives. Mythology isn't out dated - myself and many others believe that the human consciousness is constantly creating new myths and ways of story telling that help us come to terms with our lives. While the basic themes remain the same, they are being re-created, no doubt to fit new perspectives and higher levels or orders of collective understanding. I believe that we are constantly aspiring towards higher and more comprehensive levels of comprehension. Though inspired by C G Jung in the past, I am not a Jungian, as I find this strand of psychotherapy somewhat limited to archetypal ideas and dreams. I think a human being is a lot more than just a collection of inner archetypes.

So what are symbols, exactly? According to Wikipedia a symbol is "something that represents an idea, a physical entity or a process but is distinct from it. The purpose of a symbol is to communicate meaning." The way I see it, symbols have levels of meaning. There are symbols that are pretty deep and universal because of our joint collective experience of these elements of life. For instance, a snake represents the other end of evolution, i.e. very primordial or basic instincts and affects. From primordial myths and belief systems we can also see that the meaning is also attached to the universal life force and sexuality. Most people are scared of snakes so in a dream it's usually about feeling threatened by basic instincts such as sexual feelings and related issues.

The same symbols also have a shallow level of meaning which is dictated by cultural meaning and individual experience. A snake may not be threatening to someone who is a snake charmer. Someone who is a Hindu and familiar with theories about the Kundalini force would be more likely to associate the snake with religious beliefs than a Westerner would. Of course, we all know about the "one eyed snake", the male organ, which is yet another reason it tends to be connected to sexuality.

I believe that the best way to learn to understand the language of symbols is by engaging in dream interpretation (you can also study and compare myths). This is no easy task as you have to understand the parts as well as the whole, i.e., how the various elements of the dream (the symbols) relate to one another and what the context of these elements is. You need to reflect upon the associations the symbols offer as well as be able to grasp the overall feel of the dream in an intuitive way. The dream also has to relate to the dreaming person, as one has to distinguish the universal meaning of the symbols from possible individual interpretations. Intuition is truly paramount during this process. The language of symbols is not quite like an ordinary language because it relies so heavily on intuition. You also have to keep in mind, that all the symbols in your dreams associate with aspects of yourself. For instance; familiar people you see in your dreams represent qualities in yourself, and buildings usually (unless you're a gypsy traveller, one would assume) symbolise the different levels of the psyche.

People often say they dreamt about something they saw on TV before going to bed, and this becomes their reason for dismissing the existence of any deeper significance attached to the dream. There's a fallacy in this thinking because you don't dream about something because you saw it on TV, but because what you saw on TV reminded your psyche of something significant that it consequently wanted to resolve through your dream. Nothing in your dream world is haphazard. The key to successful dream interpretation is that you take into account every single aspect of the dream with the understanding that it all makes sense in some deep and significant way. We also tend to remember dreams that really are significant to us, while less important dreams are forgotten. If you're grabbed by a dream, it means it has something to say to you that you may not have realized during waking consciousness. I have personally not found anything terribly revelatory within my own dreams, but that's because I'm very interested in my inner life while I'm awake and so nothing much comes as a surprise. I find that dreams can clarify some issues, though. There is nothing quite like having had a vivid and deeply emotional dream that really tantalizes your imagination, points to great potential, and promotes contemplation about your life situation...

In order to get your imagination going, you might like to consult a book on dream interpretation. Books cannot explain everything for you and it's very important that you choose your book well! A good Jungian style book (E.g. The New Dream Dictionary by Toni Crisp) can give you ideas and impulses, and thus aid the process of understanding the way your psyche functions and what it's communicating to you.

I'm quite a literal person, and I like to communicate in a precise way. Creating images and soundscapes is a personal challenge in this respect. While pictures say more than a thousand words, and this vastness of meaning is sometimes hard for me to embrace, I also like for them to be subject to a rather literal interpretation. I don't see a contradiction in terms here, nor do I have any problem with the fact that some people will prefer to take in my images without the involvement of intellectual analysis. Others will be interested in a semantic interpretation. My experience is that both work just as well, and what really matters in the end is what resonates with people, i.e., what people feel attracted to because it mirrors themselves, and it really doesn't matter whether they are aware of the reasons for this feeling. I expect that people recognize the meaning of the symbols I use either intuitively or directly, and that they strike a cord in the attentive audience because of their relatively universal appeal. 

Artistically speaking, I started out by learning the logical language of symbols, and expressing my own inner development and the formation of a world view through symbolic art. I was intensely interested in esoteric view points while I was learning about the basic nature of reality. It was a rewarding time in my life, and I got much positive response from people from all walks of life. But things changed and I started to feel that making art about the tension between the spiritual and mundane was limited. There is work to be done in the realm of our day to day life, and I now feel compelled to do what I can to help alter people's perception of those who are marginalized in society. 

Symbols continue to be my preferred way of expression nonetheless. Through symbols I communicate a vision of life and know that it's a visual representation of something that I could also write about if I wanted to. Yet the impact is different and hopefully a more direct way of saying what I want to say. I have recently found that I can also make symbolic sound art. Symbols are endlessly versatile and a visual language based on symbols can be updated to suit a contemporary audience and crucial topics of the modern day.

The two birds and the circle is a variation on a theme of basic symbols 

that recur in all of human history.

The birds could be compared with the Yin and Yang symbol and was my logo for a long time -

 my art is generally speaking about the paradoxes that arise from the inherent dualism of life.