Aquatic Triptych

Artist Statement:
Wow, it has been forever since I've posted on this blog!  So to start off this artist statement I should mention that I never realized how much parents need to deal with when they have to supervise their kids at public attractions like the Monterey Bay Aquarium.  I went with my family, but somehow we were separated and I was stuck with the little one.  I didn't really have a problem with it because my first initial response to recording the audio was, "I'm going to record my brother! Because he's three and small and does crazy things!"  But after a good fifteen minutes of not being able to see the fish and otters, my brother would zip off to do something else because he lost interest from staring at people's backs.
The direction I wanted to go with for this project was the experience I had while looking at the jellyfish.  They were absolutely beautiful and walking through the exhibit had this ethereal feel.  When viewing the video I suggest being able to be in an extremely dark room and just looking at your surroundings.  Everything is touched by the blue, which gives the jellyfish a bright pop of color, and it feels like time has slowed down.  The audio is muffled and layered, but it's also loud.  There's something about looking at the animals that helps you to tune everyone out.
The sounds you hear in the video were collected at the Monterey Bay Aquarium.  What I noticed about them, was that there was a lot of repetition as to what was being said.  I called them "parent phrases."  I heard a lot of, "Don't run away!" "Wait for me," "I told you not to run off," and so on.  I even caught myself saying some of these parent phrases while I was watching my brother.   At the start of this project I was working with flash to make the imagery, but I couldn't grasp the concept of the keyframes and how to make my images move smoothly.  So I reverted back to what I did best, creating digital paintings and animating them from there.  The Jellyfish doesn't move across the screen like I planned, but instead stays suspended in that one moment of time.