I love Everything Everything's video for their song 'Cough Cough' directed by the band's lead singer Jonathan Higgs (aka Jon Everything). The varied use of lighting and mix of abstract and politically motivated shots (featuring CCTV footage of the 2011 London riots) are really well cut together. The mirrored shots of fire, treacle and oil floating in water caught my eye particularly as this is something I could attempt to recreate for my own photographic research. They actually reminded me of Mark Mawson's colourful dispersions of ink-in-water photography. I bought an underwater camera a few years ago for a holiday so it would be nice to have a reason to use it again.
Another source of video inspiration I found recently is by fine artist Lucy Crump. Her videos entitled "Self Portrait, 2012" and "Dying Sperm, 2013" are my favourites. I'm not quite sure how she did them but they look like she filmed them under a microscope. The study of microscopic bacteria has always fascinated me from an artistic perspective, with the kaleidoscopic colours and otherworldly feel. Watching Lucy's video self portrait made me imagine what it feels like to be on a slab in an alien space ship, with white light and translucent figures hovering above. Obviously that has likely nothing to do with what she meant for it but I think one of the most beautiful things about art is how it accesses people in different ways and displaces it from it's original meaning.
[*disclaimer: I do not own the video or image in this post, used for coursework purposes only]
