Film & Video Art Portfolio
CLOSURE (2024)
Studying Film and Media Studies at Columbia University has provided me a vast amount of knowledge on the power of filmic language and its ability to communicate complex human experiences. As an older undergraduate student and military veteran, I understand that many of these human experiences are frequently filled with internal struggles, moral questions and the search for a fundamental understanding of what is right and what is wrong. These questions can become magnified into powerful, yet opposing forces that can sit upon each our shoulders as we endeavor to reconcile their piercing disharmony.
Clearly, such subject matter is very weighty and leads to deep introspection and thought. Traditionally, a filmmaker would likely tackle such a concept through a close, portrait centered feature length work. However, I felt that the “affectiveness” of filmic language could still fulsomely convey the interiority of a person dealing with the struggles of right and wrong, vengeance and forgiveness. Invigorated by the challenge of the 5 minute format, I proceeded with production of CLOSURE.
Filmed in just over four hours of shooting, CLOSURE presents the mind of woman who must suddenly deal with her difficult familial past. Brilliantly portrayed by fellow Columbia University student Rose Hollingsworth, “Alicia” is a character tortured by estrangement and violent loss and when presented with limited time, she must do something she has avoided for most of her life. Alicia must finally resolve her painful feelings of anger and longing...she must finally find closure.
Diffidence (2024)
dif·fi·dence - /ˈdifəd(ə)ns/
noun
modesty or shyness resulting from a lack of self-confidence.
A narrative short film.
Consumption (2024)
“Sometimes your greatest threats are those closest to you.”
A project made with the following rules:
1) When shooting the scene, do not use special effects (e.g., slow motion, slow or fast shutter speeds…).
2) When editing the scene, use only straight cuts between shots—no dissolves, wipes, slow/fast shutter speeds, or special effects of any kind.
3) Don’t use voiceover; do not use music.
Why Are You? (2024)
“Searching for the reasons why can be a lost cause.”
A moving-image art piece that prioritizes ideas and concepts over narrative.
SIN FICTION (2024)
“Documentaries are real….right?”
A combination of Bill Nichols’ “Reflexive documentary” which “question[s] documentary form” and defamiliarize[s] the other modes” and his “Performative documentary” which stress[es]subjective aspects of a classically objective discourse.
MY CITY (2024)
The subject of MY CITY is a combination of all that New York City provides, with our own unending need to showcase that we were indeed provided it. Through engagement and a reconceptualizing of both MANHATTA (Strand & Sheeler- 1921) and CENTERS (Acconci-1971), I depict how much of New York City, as a character, has become a vessel to feed the embodied narcissism present in CENTERS. Utilizing rhythm and juxtaposition in much the same way as MANHATTA, I place the viewer in special events and unique vistas throughout the city, highlighting how they can be meaningfully experienced and how seldomly they actually are. Additionally, MY CITY depicts re-interpretations of CENTERS that were created through Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) software. These non-human creations show our march towards a full detachment from reality and are each placed on the giant video walls that line Times Square, walls that ensure we do not have the pleasure of forgetting the siren song of the video screen. These constructions along with images of newly made “attractions” based completely on the mirrored-self, all appear while hearing A.I. created songs that sing the praiseful words of Walt Whitman. I provide an example of the complete “affect” of a modern New York, a total reflexivity of MY CITY.
The Opportunity (2023)
“What motivates you to do good and eschew evil?”
A filmic exploration…3 pages or less.
Adjacent (2023)
A silent film.
La Ruta Taína (2023)
A poetic documentary exploring the Route of the Taínos, the indigenous people who inhabited Puerto Rico before the arrival of European colonizers. This route highlights archaeological sites, ceremonial centers, and historical locations that reflect the life and culture of the Taínos.
Three Events Unexpected (2023)
A women riding a bicycle approaches me. A skateboarder zooms past me. A motorized cart cuts off my path. My experiences are presented simultaneously, in a “triptych” of screening. In his essay “Framing The Unexpected”, Jean-Luc Lioult writes that “the ‘authorial intentions’ of the filmmaker” seek “to frame the unexpected, to facilitate the upsurge of the unforeseen” (Lioult). My frame is a moving frame, ever forward as I walk forward, increasing the unforeseen with the flow of my transit. The authenticity of the images lie in their enveloped randomness. All other entities on their own journey, unknown to me or my frame. My “triptych” presents the audience with their own sense of the unexpected, a simultaneous viewing of the unanticipated. The audience will search for three events listed in the title graphic, still unsure in which video they will appear or in what order. They do not know the events are synchronized, appearing in each video simultaneously. Even if realized, they are forced to strain so that all can be observed at once. Whichever event they catch with their eyes will still leave them looking, searching for the truth within the others. The audience experience is much like the contradiction, the paradox of the unexpected within a determined frame (Lioult). Determining the time, place and visual field to capture the unknown creates an opposite, making the unknown expected. “The documentarist does not pretend to capture the unpredictable ingenuously” (Lioult) and nor did I. Capturing the real is straddling a duality. “The most fruitful documentary strategies consist of establishing protocols within which the real can befall” (Lioult). The “triptych” is my protocol, a realness captured and foreseen. A documentary.
Treehouse (2022)
A music only narrative short film.
Las Caras (2022)
My video begins with a self-portrait of Francisco José Goya y Lucientes that he painted during the time he made a set of 82 prints he titled Los Desastres de la Guerra (The Disasters of War). The video then progresses to show a tight close up of one of faces contained in every print, presented in the order of the prints. The music is a simple three notes, meant to accentuate the black, white and gray Goya used to create his works. The video ends as it begins, with a focus on Goya, his face, as the creator and witness of The Disasters of War.
Feel The BURN (2021)
A moving-image art piece that prioritizes ideas and concepts over narrative.