Voice of Antartika: experimentalvideo

korlesme (blindness)

karakafa — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 02:10:00 -0500

by aras ozgun
6:30 mins, Hi8/Betacam, 1996

“This video is an interval between two women’s gazes. First shot is a dialogue between a woman and a man behind the camera that she looks into; “What do you see?” ”—I see you”, ”—My eyes?”, ”—Your face”, ”—All of it?” ”—Everything”, ”—Really?”, and the video gets cut off before her last word. The second gaze belongs to another woman, who paints her face by looking at her reflection on TV, by using the camera as a mirror. The two gazes confront, juxtapose and look into each other.

But, there is a bit more about this video. The first image is an accidental recording of a dialogue between me and Nur, which I discovered in a tape long after our troubled relation ended. Second shot belongs to Cagla, whom I started learning to play with video together in the early 90’s in Ankara. She recorded these images alone at home on a depressed day; she attached the camera to the TV set, sat in front of it and painted her face for hours by looking at her reflection on the screen. When she showed me the video next morning, we were both amazed with the power of images, but didn’t know what to do with the material at all. A few years later, after we separated and she moved to Istanbul, we met again and she sadly told me that there has been a theft at her apartment, her camera bag was stolen with all her tapes in it. I asked this footage, she said that tape was also gone. Two years later, I was looking for somethings in a pile of old VHS tapes, and found a copy of this footage, accidentally dubbed into VHS while copying some other stuff we shot together. The image was weary from dubbing and the passing time; the colors of the make up on her face faded away, the reflection of her eye on the screen on her iris was barely clear behind the dropouts, the overexposed picture was pulsating with the feedback of the light emitting from screen, bending, stretching, tearing. I was fascinated with the tape, I started playing with this ghostly image. I slowed it down to see every dropout, every pulse of the light, every frame of that eye looking at itself. In my own way, I made the video she didn’t have the chance to make.

This is a video about electronic dust sedimenting over layers of time.”
—Aras Ozgun, New York, 2009

File Download (6:36 min / 44 MB)

Bad Road Movie 2: Istanbul-Yerevan

jaluki — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 12:26:00 -0400

File Download (1:46 min / 4 MB)

Road Movie 1: Yerevan-Sevan or Homage to Grigor Khachatryan's Sexual Rays

jaluki — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 12:41:00 -0400

File Download (1:15 min / 9 MB)

Death to/and Photography

jaluki — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 22:44:00 -0500

Concept, Text and Voice-over: Angela Harutyunyan
Editing and Production: Aras Ozgun
Images provided by Tevž Logar
Music: Mirumir: “Beskonechnost’” and Brian Eno: “”The Lost Day”

correction – The work “This is Not My World” is dated to 1976, as opposed to 1978.

File Download (13:19 min / 64 MB)

Osseus Labyrint - Frying Pan Performance

karakafa — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 03:41:00 -0400

Osseus Labyrint is a dance/performance collective from San Francisco. This is the video recording of performance made by Osseus Labyrint at New York Downtown Arts Festival in 2000 at Frying Pan, ve Aras Özgün’ün interview with the members of collective, Hannah ve Mark at Tompkins Square Park following their performance.

Following the link below, you can find Meiling Chen’s article, “Cyborgs in Mutation: osseus labyrint’s Alien Body Art”, published in The Drama Review.

Meiling Chen, "Cyborgs in Mutation: osseus labyrint's Alien Body Art", The Drama Review 45, 2, Summer 2001 ::

File Download (29:33 min / 142 MB)

Ozlem Sariyildiz - A Piece of Monologue

karakafa — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 23:38:00 -0500

in memory of ulus baker…

text: “a piece of monologue”, samuel beckett
oread by: ronald pickup
music: scanner
camera: aras ozgun, ozlem sariyildiz
editing: ozlem sariyildiz

File Download (15:22 min / 72 MB)

cosku

karakafa — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 07:43:00 -0500

ulus baker 2002 sonbaharinda doktora tezini bitirmesinin ertesinde soyle yaziyordu;

“yaptığımız ve yapmayı sürdürdüğümüz işlere, düşündüklerimize, hissettiklerimize asla inanmadan ne kadar çok şey yaşadığımıza dair bir tartışmayı içeren doktora tezimi nihayet dün sunabildim; bazı dostlarım sayesinde kabul edildi… bir tez jürisi hikayesi anlatmayacağım elbette, ama tek söyleyebileceğim şeyi söylemeden edemeyeceğim: sevinç yerine bir “bakiye” duyguyla karşı karşıya kaldım… beş altı yıldır uğraştığım ve şu anda benim için ”çok özel” üç kişinin sayesinde tamamlanmış olduğuna kani olduğum bir çalışma sürecinden geriye sadece biraz “hüzün” kaldı... olayı odtü’deki mahfuz bir lojmanda günbatımına karşı absolut vodka, havyar, hıyar turşusu, caz, rus, amerikan, alman ve barış gücü askeri ceket ve pantalonları, rebetika ve kazaska eşliğinde kutlamaya çalıştık—ama yine geriye hüzün kaldı... her yeni gün geriye kalan günlerin sorgulanmasıdır diyerek geçiştirmeye çalıştığımız bir hüzündü bu… belki sadece duke ellington başedebilirdi böyle bir şeyle… ve öyle de oldu… ama geriye yine biraz hüzün kaldı...

hüzün geriye kalandır. biraz blues dinleyin benim için…”

ben de bu yazdiklarini okudugumda, o an elimdeki goruntulerle bu videoyu yaptim ulus’a armagan olarak, huznunu geride birakmasi umuduyla. – Aras Ozgun

File Download (2:35 min / 9 MB)

mesele(m)

karakafa — Sun, 20 May 2007 02:22:00 -0400

1992’de ODTÜ’deki bir belgesel atölye çalışmasında üretilmiş, 12 Eylül süresince hapis yatıp sonradan üniversiteye geri dönen öğrencilerle yapılmış kısa bir belgesel.

File Download (21:36 min / 84 MB)