Surreally Standing-In

If it is true that we need images that conduct between our present and past moments, then it seems clear that we are going to have to take a picture in the present that somehow recalls our past interpellation into the popcycle. Rather than try and re-create a moment from our memory, we can attempt to reproduce a shot from a film like Cindy Sherman. This film still is not from a particular film, but it gives us an uncanny feeling that it is from a film. It is this kind of surreal, uncanny, quality of not-being-able-to quite place it that we should strive for in our own image experiments.

Cindy Sherman--Untitled Film Still

We get this same instruction from Lacan, about the libido/drive being a surrealist montage. Maybe we do not literally have to copy the style of the surrealist montage, but we should take into account the surreal feeling (unheimlich) of recognizing something but not quite being able to place it. Sherman's photographs recall a kind of noir aesthetic, atmosphere, and mood, but the scene does not provide enough information for us to contextualize it within a narrative. In this way, Sherman creates a fragment that resists interpretation in the context of a particular film. We do not know the meaning, but we can identify in her face and posture a feeling and mood -- perhaps one of dread.

Jeff Wall creates a similar surreal feeling of not-quite-recognition. An image that looks "real" but some little detail or element is off and we sense that what is occurring in the image is an impossible perspective/event to capture without the work of further construction.

Jeff Wall--Milk

The picture to the right, for instance, looks plausible, but we would never be able to see the milk coming out of the container without photography. It makes it look like rushing water or a kind of sculpture. This is a kind of freezing of time, suggesting movement and stasis at the same time. Sculptural and yet potentially filmic.