Content & Story
The assignment was to catch our own fascination for urban space and architecture on film as well as our personal interest and identity. I choose to work with a song of my own as basis for the video, because singing, song writing and playing guitar music for me are important daily activities. In the 18th Century German writer Johan Wolfgang von Goethe called architecture “frozen music”. Keeping this quote in mind, this video is an experiment in which I tried to find similarities between music and architecture by using the visual image of music (sheet music) as a spatial setting. From the start, the viewer ‘walks’ through this musical scenery as if he or she moves in a linear line from one place to another. The different spaces are characterized by fascinating architectural reference projects. By the end of the film, the point of view is changed to a bird eye view so that the spectator gets an overall image of the scenery, in fact of the sheet music. Though it is clear that architecture and music are not the same, I am deeply fascinated by their similarities such as composition, rhythm, motion, emotion and ambiance.
Process & Video editing
The stop-motion film is made out of different black and white photos of a physical architectural model which I had to build before I could take the pictures. This model is in fact the sheet music of the song translated in a 3D working model (see next page). I interpreted the elements of musical notation as architectural objects. For example, the bar lines of the music are portals to the next space. The repeating pattern of these bars emphasize on the rhythm and time of the song. The lines of staff provide line perspective and scale, the different notes are playfully arranged around these lines and bars and give the space their character.
Sense and Science
music and lyrics by Marleen Klompenhouwer
music and lyrics by Marleen Klompenhouwer
Lay your thoughts down on paper
Outline the lanes which you’d like to walk
from here to oil painted skylines
and the watercoloured sea
Outline the lanes which you’d like to walk
from here to oil painted skylines
and the watercoloured sea
Hear songs in every sound you hear
carve them on trees along your way
write poetry on every sunset you see
carve them on trees along your way
write poetry on every sunset you see
I try to let silence do the talking
while cleaning up my mind
I let sense and science be in full swing
no surroundings will be undefined
while cleaning up my mind
I let sense and science be in full swing
no surroundings will be undefined
