Images on our blog!

The four images I was able to identify on our blog’s banner are as follows, two movies Talk To Her, and Do The Right Thing, and two important filmmakers Maya Deren and Marlon Riggs. Marlon Riggs was an African American filmmaker that directed several television documentaries. Riggs is known for breaking boundaries with documentary filmmaking on subjects that include black male sexuality. Riggs used his documentaries to express criticism of racism and homophobia in the United States. Riggs was born on February 3rd 1957, at I time when America was still divided racially. He used his filmmaking skills to produce many documentaries that shined the spotlight on gay, black men, to show the positive side of gay, black masculinity in the United States. He was a true innovator for his time, as he used his films to communicate and create social controversy. His films include, Ethnic Notions, Tongues United and Color Adjustment. His relationship to what we have been doing this semester is how we, as students, are able to express ourselves through film and media making. The connection I make with Riggs’ work is our final project where we incorporate sound and images. In one of the lectures we were shown a short documentary about Natural Hair, from a student of the previous semester. Natural Hair is a topic that black women are always faced with, but no one seems to talk about it. The students put together a documentary where other students were able to express and voice feelings. Through media and film, we, the new generation, are able to explore the different dimension that filmmakers like Marlon Riggs broke through for us. Maya Deren, is one of the earliest avant-garde filmmakers that broke boundaries in the world of cinema. She broke the boundaries by being one of the first female filmmakers in the 40s and 50s. She was born as Eleanora Derenkowskaia in Kiev, Ukraine on April 29th 1917. Her use of editing, cutting, superimposition, jump cutting, slow motion and other camera techniques proved that not only was she an innovator, but also ahead of her time. Some of her works include, Meshes of the Afternoon, At Land, and Meditation of Violence. She is considered a key figure in New American Cinema, by breaking all boundaries of filmmaking. She criticized Hollywood for the monopoly it was creating in the American film industry, stating that what Hollywood spends on lipstick, she is able to make films out of. Her work is closely related to what we have been doing all semester especially towards the end. One of our assignments was to analyze a film, by showing what type of editing, color, sound, etc. the director chose to use, to be able to get his/her message to the audience. Marlon Riggs and Maya Deren, are American icons in the film and media industry. As filmmakers, they broke boundaries, with sexuality, racism and feminism. Today, we live in a world where racism and feminism still exists, but filmmakers have the freedom to create their art and have it be viewed by the public without much repercussion. Riggs and Deren, grew up in a time when certain subjects were highly controversial, however, they were able to convey their message through filmmaking. Media and films are a highly effective way to communicate with the world. Our semester has taught us many ways of how we, as new media artist, can convey our style, messages and representation of ourselves through the use of media.