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Phil Hastings
Phil Hastings An artist's statement
The Morphology Series is fundamentally concerned with exploring liminal states using abstract and poetic forms. I create filmic manifestations of thresholds for the viewer to experience and explore. In each video, a wall of organic matter undulates, at times seductive or mesmerizing, often quickly changing to a frantic or nervous tick. This living, breathing matter becomes a proxy for the viewer’s own experience of standing at a threshold. Within these structures an orifice opens and closes through which a black void can be seen leading to regions unknown, and full of possibility, ripe for personal projection. The sciences, especially biology and entomology form much of the visual foundation and the creative process for the Morphology Series. I am not so much interested in scientific absolutes, but instead, I’m inspired by the process of investigation and exploration, which is inherent in the sciences. This searching is directly tied to my interest in threshold states of being. Along the creative process I am inspired by the mechanization of organic matter whether it is at the cellular or macro level. It is while observing these organic machines, a cell or a worm, a bee or mantis, that I personally begin to appreciate a higher level at work, a sublime order and design that can only be admired with awe. 9.14.8.15.18.18.5.19.3.15 was specifically created for the Vascular Modes show at Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center in Buffalo, NY, and was a response to and inspired by, the Gates Vascular Institute and its architecture. The institute is a medical facility for heart conditions and research. I started with the idea of the architecture itself being a vast network of vessels and valves opening and closing to pump the essential life throughout the building. With this concept as a starting point I shot very basic, video on my phone of the interior of the building and then began the process of manipulating the video. This original material can be seen here: https://vimeo.com/56859627 The process by which this and other works in the series are created is much like genetic modification, I enter into the material at the most basic level, in my case, the pixel, and through manipulation transform and alter the original data to create something new while retaining trace elements of the original. This transformation is a matter of organic exploration. The more I push these results, the more removed the final imagery is from the original. Through precise animation using key frames applied to custom designed software effects each project’s outcome is realized through countless evolutionary steps in process. This process while rooted in technology is a very personal and tactile experience for me. What can be seen as a cold and calculated technique is very much a means to an end. I am ultimately attempting to create image and sound that is viscerally seductive, metaphorically intricate and emotionally provocative to deliver a transformative experience for the viewer.
An interview with
Phil Hastings Dear Phil, here is the shortlist of questions for your interview, feel absolutely free. It would be great if you can send us your replies by March 8th, however, if you need more time, do not hesitate to contact us: we will quickly find a solution. Best, STIGMART10 Team -‐"Organic matter", "breathing and living matter" are not only recurrent words in your statement about 9.14.8.15.18.18.5.19.3.15, but a trademark of your filmmaking. We have encontered many artists who had focused their research on a more materic approach to video, however, it is really hard to find a filmmaker whose effort to explore matter lead him to biology. Could you introduce our readers to this aspect of your art? Biology – living matter it is what we are. It is the thing that binds us all. We may have different ideologies, politics and belief systems but we are all the same at the most basic levels. So we need to hold to this and embrace that which makes us human. I’ve never attempted to make my work overtly political or ideologically based. I would rather not limit the transformative potential of my work to only those who agree with a particular opinion. I think that there are base elements within biology that we can all relate to. Life, sex and death are processes that we all share. I enjoy bringing all of these together in a singular experience. A number of years ago I was researching the Rorschach Inkblot tests for a project I was doing. One of key things that I learned from this research was that the tests are not about understanding what you perceive but what you apperceive. Apperception is comprehension based on past experiences. I really like the idea of viewers bringing their past experiences to the work. Some may see the work as very cellular with the openings being (as originally conceived) as valves opening and closing but clearly others will see overtly sexual imagery. It will depend on what each viewer brings to the piece.
Phil Hastings
Whatever experiences a viewer does bring it will be applied to this undulating movement that breathes. I’d like to think that as one watches these works their breathing falls in sync with the movement of the images. If I was able to have that affect over the viewer with the work I’d be really pleased. It is not a matter of words, or a sort of retrò feticism toward celluloid, your research go beyond this. Speaking of that could be misleading, however, we have to ask you:what are the relationship between video, celluloid and organic matter? I think my relationship between all of these is conflicted and malleable, philosophical and technical. I love celluloid and video. They are both materials that can be used in ways beyond their original intent, producing unexpected surprises. As a filmmaker or video artist, I am always first drawn to the image and you can’t produce an image without matter of some kind. It’s maybe simply the right material for me to create with. When I’m teaching I’m often
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talking to students about why we create an image in a certain way. We need to ask, “why do I want my video to look like film?” For many students who have never shot film it comes down to “it looks cool” but this isn’t a really well reasoned answer. I think there should always be some purpose behind the choices we make even if they are sometimes subconscious but drawing from past experiences and/or research. For me celluloid has a texture, this texture is coded with all sorts of meaning and there have been many scholars who have done a much better job of dissecting this.
find that I’m trying to infuse the video with texture hoping that this effort helps move the image and idea beyond the medium. If I’m successful the essence of this new work will feel alive and this creation process will have been successful.
My response to this texture is that it feels “alive” and organic, more so then video. Especially when it comes down to grain versus pixel, and so I’m stuck with trying to balance these conflicted ideas because I’m typically working in video but am a lover of celluloid. I
When did you become interested in biology and its relationship with art? I’m sure it stems form having a dad who was an environmental/biology teacher and growing up on a small farm. I’ve always been involved in art and certainly the environments that I found my self within inspired much of my subject matter. Growing up I would visit my dad’s classroom and be really intrigued by the taxidermy and collections of different specimens. Terrariums and other small-‐scale eco system models were always interesting
in the sense that they were self-‐contained worlds that could be nurtured, controlled and explored. When I was in graduate school I began to revisit some of these interests in more depth. I was specifically interested in using Linnaean classifications. I began using these invented taxonomic naming structures as a way of developing coded meaning into some of my film characters. Using Latin was a way of trying to get viewers to take a more active role in the work. I’m still using this today by coding the titles of my work. In your statement, you say "This process while rooted in technology is a very personal and tactile experience for me", could you better explain this sentence? I think this comes from a desire to understand from experience. This is how I’ve always learned best; It is a very phenomenological way of understanding. The more I can do to create work that relies on image that references the tactile the better. Texture and form often trigger memory, and I think they are often the foundation I use to create those viscerally seductive, metaphorically intricate and emotionally provocative image to deliver a transformative experience for the viewer. What artistic media do you prefer to work in and there any that you don’t like to use? I’ve worked in film (celluloid) and video, photography, sculpture, drawing, painting etc., I’m really drawn to film but the reality is the resources needed to shoot and finish in film are not always available. I also find that because I’m heavily invested in the manipulation of images, video tends to be a more pliable material to use, and in my case most of this manipulation happens in the postproduction process. Video allows me to push the pixels around, build layers, cut out and move imagery. The way I work is very much about building an image versus capturing it, so in that sense the image making process draws on my experience with sculpture. This is one of the ways I begin to create threedimensionality in these abstract videos. I build up layers of different video, textures and filters. Most of the Morphology work has only one video layer but embedded in this layer are upwards of twenty or thirty effects. Each one of the individual effects may also have a number of controls that are animated using key-frames. Some of these effects are custom designed by myself when I can’t get the control or look I want with the basic software.
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These custom effects can have fifty or more controls each key-frame-able. Depending on the project it can also a bit like glazing with oil paint in the sense that I am often creating a specific level of imagery exporting it, (like waiting for a painted layer to dry) then re‐importing that “dry” layer to add more on top of it. In this way I am forcing myself to give up complete control. I have considered 3D animation and know that it would give me a lot more control over the final image but the process is too slow and too exact for me. With my video I am more prone to experiencing those unexpected accidents that are often part of celluloid filmmaking. In general the filmmaking process is where I’m able to bring all of my various interests together.
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What’s next for Phil? Are there any new projects on the horizon? Too many to count, one of the outgrowths of this current technique or process I’m using is a collection of invented organisms. These video‐derived creatures will be displayed on small video screens that are integrated into wooden display cases. The designs of these cases will draw inspiration from Victorian scientific tools and references the historical act of collecting the unknown to better understand our significance in the universe. It all goes back to the drawers of specimens in my father’s classroom. This work is specifically intended for gallery settings with each video labeled with the pertinent scientific information associated with the created specimens including field notes and Linnaean classifications.
I’m also deep in preproduction on a feature film that will be a more narrative exploration of many of the themes I’m interested in. It’s a story about a scientist observing a variety of insects, arthropods and other similar creatures of the earth, but its ultimately about how we strive to understand our place in the world and how this search is often undermined by the tools we use to find these answers. It’s not necessarily as dreadful and hopeless as it sounds. I do expect that there will be a solution or at least a possible solution to the character’s dilemmas. I am really interested in challenging the historical paradigm of the narrative film making process by reducing the number of people required to finish a film. As a formal exercise in alternative filmmaking practices, I will function as writer, director, producer, production designer, cinematographer, sound designer, visual effects creator and editor. It’s not that I don’t like working with others in fact I really enjoy being on other filmmakers projects, but I think when working on my own ideas, I don’t want to burden someone else with my uncertainties while I try to figure something out or my expectations of what it will take to be finished. There are other projects including the third film in the Lake Series that I’m finishing up right now. I’m also collaborating with a musician and film composer on a music video for an EP album he is doing. I’m using video of the cannibalistic mating behaviors of praying mantises that I’ve shot.