David Lynch, was born in 1946 in a small town much like that shown in many of his films. He ended up attending various art schools, one particular school in a violent and run-down area of Philadelphia inspired him to create his first movie, “Eraserhead” He worked on it obsessively for many years and it was commented to be almost unrealisable it was so “weird” but with the help of distributor Ben Barenholtz, it became a cult following. This helped Lynch to create his first mainstream film in 1980, “The Elephant Man” With the success of his films he went on to achieve a huge cult following with his surreal TV series “Twin Peaks”. After this he also draws comic strips and has devised multimedia stage events.
He is known to be a very surreal artist and creates pieces which forget about logic. “It's better not to know so much about what things mean or how they might be interpreted or you'll be too afraid to let things keep happening. Psychology destroys the mystery, this kind of magic quality. It can be reduced to certain neuroses or certain things, and since it is now named and defined, it's lost its mystery and the potential for a vast, infinite experience.” He has created many video installations which I will go on to talk about next. “I really believe there's, like, an ocean of ideas. And all of the ideas are sitting there. They bob up from time to time and come into your conscious mind and you know them. When a good idea bobs up, it really smacks you. It's like a piece of electricity and you see the whole thing and you feel it and you know what to do. It all comes with the idea.” David Lynch.
The second film from David lynch, produced in 1968 is The Alphabet. It’s a picturesque film, like a painting coming to life. It has a simple narrative that represents childhood and ageing. The idea came from Lynch’s wife, Peggy Reavey when her niece had a nightmare and was saying the alphabet like she was being tormented. “So that's sort of what started 'The Alphabet' going." Peggy stars in the film as the woman having the nightmare. Lynch was awarded an American Film Institute production grant and became a minor celebrity for this short film.
When I watched this at first I just felt a little confused and intrigued. When you watch it again you start to get a bit more meaning from it, I had the idea that it was related to some form of nightmare and childhood. The alphabet is sang in the same tune as the rhyme taught to small children, but the scenes are quite frightening and at points the singing sounds quite hypnotic. The images are very off the wall but you can see that David lynch is a very talented artist. He seems to have kept to the colours red, black and white which are conventional colours for horror scenes. Most critics review the film as “weird”
“Yeah some things critics say bother me. I really believe in constructive criticism instead of destructive” He received comments from artists like “Downright horrifying, Frightening imagery, Another Phobia Envisioned by David Lynch, Art as horror”
“Yeah some things critics say bother me. I really believe in constructive criticism instead of destructive” He received comments from artists like “Downright horrifying, Frightening imagery, Another Phobia Envisioned by David Lynch, Art as horror”
Originally titled, six men getting sick and released in 1966. This is a one minute short film played on a loop six times of six men being sick as their stomachs grew and their heads caught fire, whilst a siren plays overhead. It was shown on a screen of three human figures molded from Lynch’s own head by the artist Jack Fisk. Showing the film against this background meant the image was distorted but apparently this was intentional. Lynch claims he only created this as an experiment because he wanted to see his work in movement.
This short film isn’t as in depth as the alphabet in my opinion. The titles gives a big enough clue as to what the video is about, however you still get the strange unanswerable randomness in lynch’s artwork. Once again this video is quite eery and dark with a simple of use of sirens played over the animation a different mood is set and you get more from the footage.
Roger Ebert from Chicago Sun-Times commented on the film saying “The story line sounds plain and simple, but the movie is enlightened by Lynch's impassioned narration and by a gallery of small comic details.”
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