INSOMNIA - MY LATEST MULTI MEDIA PROJECT AND MESSAGE

Thumbnail picture for "Insomnia"

So here it is finally, the multi media project that was supposed to only take a couple of days... in fact, the biggest issue was the sound, as my original recordings weren't really good enough. Martin has a mike that borrowed, and I used some free software to do the recording with. The quality wasn't fantastic. After a lot of fiddly tweaking in Premiere Elements I had a soundtrack that Martin then worked on to remove crackle and other disturbing elements with software that he already has, since he's recorded his own music in the past and enjoys creating soundscapes. He also added a bit of ambience to the words.

Martin said he was surprised I tackled this subject matter intuitively rather than literally. I guess I feel a different kind of freedom to be expressive through this medium. I think it's liberating and makes a change from the fixed nature of a 2D image. I do get very tired from editing, but hope that in time I will become more fluent in using this and find it easier. Martin encouraged me to go on when I was being despondant, feeling it wasn't good enough. I realise I can't compete with people who have been to film school or are being paid a lot of money to create fantastic moving images with expensive software. My projects have to be about the atmosphere and the message. I want to talk about things that I really know about, through and through. That's my excuse for making art.

I put my soul into this project, it was really a "gut feeling project". Someone said it reminded them of a scene from "Fight Club", in which it's being said that with insomnia, nothing is real; everything is a copy of a copy of a copy. That was an interesting view point, because it's true that there are reverberating echoes going through your mind when you start panicking about not sleeping, everything is magnified and there's often a kind of terror that becomes a waking nightmare. I think most people can relate to this feeling of layers of anguish and a distorted sense of reality. I think I instinctively decided to go down that route rather than talk about it more literally from my own experience of a medical disorder (which is very real). This I tried to do in my biopic "Vivi-Mari in a Day" (though I still feel I may not have been succesful in getting the message across sufficiently well).

This is no longer "just" a slide show, but uses both video clips, stills and my own sound. It really is a lot like collaging! I voted for simplicity rather than adding too many effects. Effects for the sake of effects is just empty. I ask myself, is this effect really adding to the message, and only use it if I think it is. I was using some old film effect here, part of it is to cover up the garishness of indoors photography (I use floodlights). But on the other hand, a touch of vintage is in line with my other work so I think it's justified in many ways. In some ways, when you're lying awake, you exist in a kind of timeless space that I wanted to enhance with this effect. It's not easy to convey a sense of horror without cheap effects these days... movies are packed with such effects. The aim is instead to portray a very personal experience and hope that has a different tone that captures other people's imagination in a different way.

This short 4 min film in which I have staged myself, is an evocative artistic expression and vision of insomnia, which is sometimes part of serious health conditions, or one all on its own. Though it's not meant to be just a medical document, but also a vision of despair in general, the medical aspect and my concern is obviously at the forefront. The lack of good quality sleep also leads to many other medical problems such as the worsening of the primary health issue (e.g. fibromyalgia and ME/CFS), depression, anxiety, cognitive problems and memory loss, inability to cope with life's normal challenges, and to focus during the day. With this video I've sought to create a representation of the kind of problem that about 25% of the population allegedly experiences in one form or another, though mostly only periodically. I hope and believe that most people can identify with this situation at least on some level, and that it also helps understand what serious insomnia can feel like. 

This is a document, but not a literal documentation, and shows only part of the problem as I experience it myself, as in reality there's more to it than this. It seemed more important to me to create a film that might strike a cord in most people who watch it. It's about the emotional response to a problem, rather than the problem itself.

I'm no doubt influenced by minimalist music, notably Steve Reich and Philip Glass, and some of my inspiration may very well come from them. 

"Managing an illness that's happening when you're not looking is like walking a tightrope" (From the description of "The Impossibility of Sleeplessness and Damien Hirst doesn't Exactly Make it Better"). It's a problem that is hard to cure since sleep happens when we're not in control.

P.S

I got the old film effect here. There are a few options. They work but you will need to be able to unzip them first.

Read how I found that this work resonates with Vito Acconci's work from 1971 in this article.

A STRAIGHTFORWARD COLLAGE ABOUT DISILLUSIONMENT AND INDIFFERENCE

Vivi-Mari Carpelan: "Your Indifference is Breaking my Heart", 55x38 cm, copyright 2012

This is my latest handmade collage for "Project X". In this one, I have as usual used a photo of myself. The background consists of pages from a book from about 1900 of poetry in the English language, it's a section of poetry that is "didactic and moral". Basically it's a lot of high flown, flowery words without much sincerity, the typical moralist "pointing fingers" in very explicit ways that was common in poetry of the 19th and 18th C - it's trying to teach us something about life, often in a rather self-righteous and shallow way. Yet it is still echoed in the way many people talk today when they try and advice you about how you should lead your life. It's easy to tell others how they should live but much harder to act accordingly. This is one of the basic truths about the human condition. It's typical that those who pretend to be spiritually minded in some way give themselves away by babbling too much. I think a certain reticence and control over the faculty of speech can be the sign of a greater spiritual mind. 

I wanted this image to be a direct confrontation with the viewer. It's you and me - alright? This is personal. I thought we were supposed to be in the same boat? Why are you indifferent? I want to know. Why have you closed off and decided that you don't need to be empathic and interested in people who are the so-called weaker members of society and that they should just pull themselves together? Why are you not helping to instigate laws that make us all truly equal in the deepest possible sense, where anyone who isn't out there with the intent of hurting others should be treated with respect and seen as a person worthy of a dignified life regardless of their ability to "contribute" to society? All of you out there, who don't notice my struggle to survive within the frame of this society, or care about anyone else in a similar, marginalized situation - you all break my heart. 

“This is personal. It's about you and me. Look me in the eye and tell me you really don't care that I'm not as able bodied as yourself. Look me in the eye and stop giving me all that moral bullshit about taking responsibility for my own health. I am. You have no idea to which degree I'm struggling to manage. But I can't do it alone. I can't do it without your help. Ultimately, society is the cause of my condition. You didn't realise that, did you? We're all in it together, whether you like it or not. Please, can't you see that? Your indifference is breaking my heart.”

A JESTING REFERENCE TO DAMIEN HIRST... A NEW COLLAGE WITH PHOTOGRAPHS

Vivi-Mari Carpelan: "The Impossibility of Sleeplessness and Damien Hirst isn't exactly making it any better"
copyright 2012

I wanted to do something with my abstract photography for Project X, but I sat for an entire day wondering what the heck to do with it. Eventually, having looked through a lot of imagery that could be used and found a photo we took for something Martin wanted to do a couple of years ago, this is what came about. It then occurred to me that it was very obviously about insomnia. The sense of walking a thin line or trying to balance my existence like a tight rope dancer when my medication is failing is imminent. When I mentioned "the impossibility" to Martin, he said oh be careful, that's what Damien Hirst has called a lot of his stuff. I thought that's excellent, yet another thing to lose sleep over! I mean his success, his money - and I'm not feeling any enormous kinship with his art, haha. In case it's not clear yet, my reference is ironic, if even sarcastic.


"In a general sense, this piece is about the fear of a sudden fall into a state of despair and depression, and how difficult it is to remain balanced and “on top of things”. More specifically this piece is about insomnia, which in severe cases involves constant threats of medication not working any more, while one is being pumped up with habit forming medication in the first place. It's the fear of going insane with severe cognitive and physical impairment and with physical flare ups due to lack of sufficient good quality sleep... and never getting any really useful help from the medical establishment. On top of this there's the sleep schedule which always goes wrong, ie. something disturbs one's routines and tips the wagon so you end up sleeping/dozing/lying around well into the afternoon and always feeling the day goes by while you're simply useless. Managing a condition that happens when you're not looking, is like walking a tight rope, knowing you could fall any time. This piece is part of Project X. When I thought of the name including the word "impossibility" it became a reference to titles by Damien Hirst and his rather (in my mind) undeserved financial success."

All the photos are my own except for that of the bird.