Multimedia artist showcases collection of abstract videos inspired by pop culture
Michael Robinson, a film, video and collage artist, speaks to students in the transmedia colloquium class about his multimedia work including a 13-minute film entitled "These Hammers Don't Hurt Us." Allen Chiu | Staff Photographer
Anyone who is epileptic or suffers from seizures probably shouldn’t watch a Michael Robinson film. Strobe lights, mixed patterns and bright colors are all major parts in his work.
Robinson, a critically acclaimed film, video and collage artist, showcased four of his works to a packed crowd in Shemin Auditorium in the Shaffer Art Building on Tuesday. He is known for his multimedia work that explores meditated experiences while employing humor and terror.
Susannah Sayler, an assistant professor in the College of Visual and Performing Arts’ department of transmedia, arranged the event for transmedia colloquium, a class that studies the history of media arts. As a part of the course, Sayler brings in a number of visiting artists, including photographer Vincent Cianni and video artist Gary Kibbins.
“[Robinson] has been the best artist session so far,” said Yinglan Zhang, a freshman in the School of Visual and Performing Arts. “He’s really good at creating interesting visual effects and manipulating different footage.”
Last year, Sayler saw Robinson’s work at the Everson Museum of Art and said she fell in love with it. She decided he would be a good example of the history of video art, something students in the class are currently working on.
“Michael’s work is really relevant because it draws on pop culture for its source material, and video art comes out of the tradition of television in contrast to cinema,” Sayler said.
In 1999, Robinson studied film at Ithaca College. He then pursued his master’s at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Those years in grad school, Robinson said, set him on his current filmography path.
The titles of Robinson’s works are lines from films or songs he features in his videos, or puns on the messages he delivers.
“These Hammers Don’t Hurt Us,” made in 2010, is a 13-minute video inspired by Robinson’s obsession with pop star Michael Jackson, prior to his death. Robinson was influenced for this particular project by the close relationship between Jackson and actress Elizabeth Taylor, who was featured in Jackson’s 1992 Egyptian-themed music video “Remember the Time.”
The next project Robinson showed was “The General Returns From One Place to Another,” a work from 2006. It is an 11-minute video that teeters between romance and terror, with a Frank O’Hara monologue appearing on the screen in subtitles. Next followed an eight-minute segment from Robinson’s first narrative film, “Circle In the Sand” (2012), about vagabonds living on a beach overseen by military soldiers.
Robinson’s latest work, “The Dark, Krystle,” was saved for last. This film explores the clichés of the protagonist and antagonist of 1980s American prime-time soap opera “Dynasty.” Unlike his other works, “The Dark, Krystle” has footage that wasn’t as manipulated.
Most of Robinson’s films utilize original pop culture material, usually sourced from DVDs, which were either altered or incorporated into his own footage. Another technique incorporated into all of Robinson’s films, aside from bright colors, is intense flickering.
“The narrative is supposed to feel overwhelmed…[serving as a] melodramatic push,” Robinson said.
Robinson traces his interests of experimenting with film to cinema and how often he played video games as a kid. The logic he attaches to video games, and the sort of emotional relationship he built with them, is not that different from navigating an abstract work, he said.
His early teen years were when Robinson said he first gravitated toward playing with the abstract. At 11 years old, he watched the TV series “Twin Peaks,” and it stuck with him ever since. Robinson then entered a time period in which he wanted to see the scariest movies possible, not so much for their stories but for their fear and terror based on abstract ideas.
Now, Robinson finds himself inspired by more contemporary cinema. His favorite recent movie, he said, is Harmony Korine’s “Spring Breakers,” which he refers to as the best movie of the year.
As an artist, abstract is Robinson’s favorite genre. Yet, Robinson’s main goal is to make his work as self-evident as possible and not confuse his audience.
Said Robinson: “I like the challenge as a maker and a viewer of achieving an emotional experience out of things that don’t necessarily declare themselves as emotional or sensible.”
