ROBIN COOPS

JAZZING FRAMES

Robin Coops is a multi-disciplinary artist based in the Netherlands. He studied directing at the institute of performative arts in Maastricht and finished his Master’s at the Royal Conservatory of Music in The Hague, in close collaboration with the composition department. Interested in the tension between control and losing control, he explores how we are guided by, or able to manipulate political, technological and social systems and how we can move freely in the given circumstances. In his work he uses technology to research the tension between the analogue body and the digital machine. Genres like horror and tech-noir are used as a device to emphasize these themes. In his work he puts different disciplines into a dialogue to create a single unified composition. The results are films, performative installations and audio-visual concerts.

www.robincoops.com

Creating interdisciplinary works has always been a natural path for me. As a young boy, I played the violin, took acting lessons at a youth theatre school, played in bands and began making my own surrealist films. After my education at the theatre school in Maastricht and the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, I began to focus more and more on opera productions and audiovisual concerts. The collaborations became bigger and the concepts more advanced.

Over time, I lost the intuitive touch which I had as a child. Being a perfectionist, and having critical people around me, resulted in me over-thinking all my projects and actions. My thoughts and feelings were out of balance with the results. I became a slave of my own concepts.

How to create circumstances resulting in the loss of selfconsciousness and the rediscovery of a childlike intuitive response? How can I open up the frames I impose on myself and my collaborators, to exploration? How to become a performative director who thinks through making? Introducing the metaphor of jazz helps me to regain playfulness. The fact that jazz itself already implies a set of rules and a practice of improvisation, helps to structure the work and experience. I’m using the word frame as an equivalent for this set of rules in my audio-visual works, it is simultaneously a boundary and a creative tool. Jazzing frames, then, means creating the space for improvisation within the frame of the work and eventually reviewing the frame itself. I invite myself, my team and my audience to this process instead of determining a single interpretation. It is not about losing control but embracing multiple possibilities that the frame provides.

I made several experiments to research my method. The photos show a small selection of moments constituting this journey.

PREVIZ - Digital rehearsal space. A previsualisation film exploring how PREVIZ can be a platform and device to generate rather than execute ideas.

LIBRARY- Constant reframing. The work started by making burst photos, followed by constantly making new selections and combinations of the pictures.

THE PLAGUE - Participatory filmmaking. An experiment based on a method called Viewpoint. I made the filmmakers into performers and composers of image, movement and sound. The filming process became a performance in itself. Performers: Marleine van der Werf, Giorgia Piffaretti, Peter Hammer, Bora Lee, Stefan Pavlović, Robin Coops.

SKIN - Reframing existing material. An experiment in deconstructing existing material and trying to build a new vocabulary. The original footage is from the documentary Mondo Cane by Gualtiero Jacopetti and Franco Prosperi. The skin became the basic theme of this operatic sci-fi experiment.

TOUCH - The mind-map as a script. This mind-map consists of 10 scenes, including different cinematographic experiments. This circle became the basic script for TOUCH.

TOUCH became a short surrealist horror film about the fear and the desire to lose control. A photographer becomes his own subject when he meets a mysterious figure. He’s being seduced by this animal-like creature, but with his desire to get closer also his fear grows. The music and movements in the film guide us into a nightmare in which our character slowly loses control over his own body. The film poses the question ‘where does my skin end and yours begin?’ How to preserve one’s autonomy in the presence of the other?

TOUCH: Director and editor Robin Koops Cinematographer Joris Bulstra Art-director Maze de Boer, Desiree Brands Costumes Martijn Kramp Composer Henry Vega Sound Design Roel Wildenburg Choreographer Alessio Reedijk Make-up artist Alina Stefan Assistant make-up artist Jolien de Doelder, Yasmin Bakker Special props Rolf te Booij Production Andrea van Bussel, Kristina Daurova, Lotte van der Stap Gaffer Koen van Bergen Light assistant Merlijn Willemsen, Sophie Schut Focus puller Kasper Stegeman, Indy Hamid Grip Auke Verhoeff Character A Maarten Heijnens Character B Fons Dhossche Dancer 1 Giorgio Lepelblad Dancer 2 Celine Moza Dancer 3 Antoine Coppi Dancer 4 Esther Murdock Dancer 5 Joshi Murdock

Special thanks to All the crowdfunders (see film-credits) Camalot Hendrik Muller Fonds Vrijvrouwe van Renswoude Stichting Bekker-la Bastide Fonds