If you have an interest in the Gothic and fantastical, I highly recommend exploring the beautifully sensitive work of Swedish artist and animator Alexander Jansson.
I recently discovered Cyriak Harris, a freelance multimedia artist and animator from the UK. His work has a delirious yet strangely compelling 'Monty Python meets Escher' vibe, as exemplified by this video:
Cyriak is very interesting to me, because his surreal work is ideally suited to the internet. It reflects the viewpoint of someone very familiar with online memes and themes. But it also draws on older artistic traditions, remodeling them in the context of contemporary media forms.
"Like some kind of animated stew, the ingredients of this video simmered and bubbled for about 2 years before I tipped it steaming onto the internet. The screams echo to this day."
Check out lots more of Cyriak's music, comics, paintings, gifs and videos at his website here. I especially like this video, in which the cast of 'Eastenders' become zombies and eat brains. So great.
Just in case you were suffering the mid-week blues... I suggest you get happy with Unko-san.
“Unko-san,” a new anime series about a brown turd-shaped fairy with lots of luck, is fast becoming the rage among high school girls in western Japan. Short episodes of the anime are now showing in the Osaka area on Kansai TV’s “Otoemon” music program. The stories revolve around Unko-san — whose name is a play on the Japanese words for “luck” (un) and “crap” (unko) — and his quest for happiness on Lucky Island, which is populated by a host of other poo fairies.
You can also play Step Mania with the Unko-san theme song.
Catchy!
For us collector types there are key-chains and plush toys, so you can hug your little brown fairy nice and close.
Sometimes writing feels a bit like having a dual personality. One half of your brain is really dedicated and focused, while the other half is... well, easily distracted.
I was recently surprised to find this video dedicated to animator Ray Harryhausen. Who knew he was behind so many classic beasts? And so many Sinbad movies?
Harryhausen's biography, on his official website, is a really interesting read, as it shows how his career developed from a childhood spent monster making in his parent's garage. I'm not ashamed to admit that I love monster models, and it is pretty awesome to see how stop-animation can bring them to life. It also helps that many of them have hybrid bodies.
I'm not sure if this is the same creature as above, but she definitely has style. This is from The 7th Voyage of Sinbad:
The cyclops is also good:
But I think my favourite might be the skeleton:
Those special effects are impressive, especially when you consider the film was released in 1958. According to the biography:
"There was to have been five more sequences in the film but they were dropped. (1) Sinbad and the Princess Parisa are chased by giant rats conjured up by the evil Sokurah but because Charles didn’t like rats, nor snakes, it was taken out.(2) Sinbad and his men are attacked by bat-devils.(3) A fight between two Cyclops.(4) Sirens with mermaid tails.(5) A giant serpent attacks sailors in a tree. This again was dropped because Charles objected.
Charles had Ray’s hands insured for a million dollars."
This Charles sounds like a real party pooper.
But it's fine, because there were to be more skeletons!
I love how they move; so spry, falling over and jumping about. In their movements they actually seem more 'real' than some of the CGI beasts served up in contemporary films.
This short animation by Dimitri Kozma popped up today on one of my regular keyword searches for 'grotesque' on YouTube.
"Besides the bizarre factor, the animation was created with a second layer of interpretation as a critical appreciation of the superfluous and disposable."
The scatological aspect of grotesqueness has been sadly lacking in this blog since my early posting about gross science. I apologise, and hereby promise to provide more toilet humour in future.
