Robert Seidel 

(*1977) is an experimental filmmaker and projection artist based in Germany. He started studying biology at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena; 2004 Diploma in Media Design from the Bauhaus University Weimar.

Robert Seidel began studying biology, but went on to gain a media-design diploma from the Bauhaus University Weimar. His films have been shown in art museums as well as at more than 250 festivals (Prix Ars Electronica, onedotzero, Dotmov, etc.), and honoured with prizes such as an Honorary Award at the KunstFilmBiennale and the prize for Best Experimental Film at the Ottawa International Animation Festival.

 

Source: IdN

 

 

Blurring the traditional lines between film-making and animation, his organic and ebullient work teems with an almost living energy as he studies the shapes and patterns created by an environment and then overlays that with his own graphic style. The resulting mix, an other-worldy visual evolution of nature and technology, is always beautiful and shockingly unique. They are so rooted in experience that they seem familiar, but at the same time we know we're looking at something we've never seen before. It's almost jarring, but incredibly so.

His latest work is no exception. Human Paint is a stunning new identity for England's Channel 5, while Dream Mountains was commissioned by Hong Kong’s IdN Magazine for part of its upcoming anniversary.

Deservedly so, Seidel is also part of the motion design dream team that have created pieces for Universal Everything's amazing Advanced Beauty HD-DVD project. Seidel's contribution, Appearing Disappearance, is crazy beautiful.

Continuing to push and innovate, this year Seidel took his work off the screen and into the real world. In Processes: Living Paintings he projeted a 15 x 36 metre projection onto the side of the Phyletics Museum in Jena, Germany. Transferring his swirling, elemntal style from animation into light, he created an installation of strobbing, rippling, shifting colour.  

 

Source: shape+colour

 

 

Could you tell us about yourself including your background?

My name is Robert Seidel, I'm from Jena, a small university town in Germany, where I studied one year Biology before doing my diploma in media design at the time-honored Bauhaus Weimar. I'm an experimental filmmaker and projection artist torn between art, science, computers and nature's beauty resulting in the name of my website.


How did you start making films?

My dad introduced me to computers quite early, but he ensured that my brother and I don't play games only. So I began to paint digitally, wrote little fractals applications and later got into 3D. With these technical skills I started to do animation at Bauhaus, but there were no classical animators around, so I had the freedom to develop my style and express very personal stories.


Could you tell us about the concept of your works?

I'm doing organic, semi-abstract animations that have a certain complexity and connect with the viewer on an emotional level. It’s mostly transported by something that gets more beautiful with every viewing, only because you see different layers – like a person that gets more precious over time. But the films also need this time as well, they are no flashing video clips or screen savers like some people think.

I'm interested and fascinated by a lot of things, which I try to combine in my movies. First there is nature in all its form and beauty. Second, the possibilities the computer has to offer, especially the way to recombine and undo things are an important part of my working. The third source is fine arts (Marcel DuchampDieter Roth, etc) and experimental filmmaking (Jan SvankmajerMaya Deren, etc), which really got me thinking how to develop new spatial and temporal concepts to evoke a certain emotion in the viewer. In the end the beholder itself has become a very surprising part to me – how people react and what stories they unfold for themselves is really helping me to understand a lot of things. But I still have to learn a lot…

 

Source: SHIFT

 

 

Robert Seidel, architecture, berlin, design

Reading

Audio.Visual - On Visual Music and Related Media (2009) by Cornelia Lund and Holger Lund (Eds.) is divided into two sections: the first deals with the academic discussion on the subject of visual music; the second introduces contemporary paradigms of audio-visual praxis in brief presentations and contextualises them. Apart from being a guide in the historical sense, this new volume provides theoretical approaches to understanding and making visual music. (Fluctuating Images)

 

SEE ALSO

Transforma (Baris Hasselbach, Luke Bennett and Simon Krahl), a Berlin based video artist collective, combine the momentum of VJ improvisation with the power of highly composed imagery and narrative. Transforma started producing experimental video art in 2001 and have been taking their imageworld and production processes to higher levels of absurdity ever since. They have worked on promos, concert video and live cinema approaches, in collaboration with Apparat and Funkstörung among others, and have VJed in clubs in Berlin and around Europe. (CueMixMagazine)

Fredrik Olofsson is educated in music composition at the Royal Music Academy in Stockholm and at the Music College in Piteå. He writes software for interactive installations, fiddles with electronics and performs audiovisual pieces under the alias redFrik. (HfM Karlsruhe)

Collaborations include twelve years with the group MusicalFieldsForever, making interactive art for museums, exhibitions and public spaces. Fredrik Olofsson is also working as a researcher on the Rhyme project in Norway and teaches the computational art class at UdK in Berlin. (Digital in Berlin)

Sonic Graphics/Seeing Sound (2000) by Matt Woolman presents exemplary work from studios around the world in three sections: Notation analyses the use of sign and symbol systems in creating identity and branding for music artists, recording projects and performances; Material considers how products can package the intrinsic nature of the music they contain; and Atmosphere looks at how space and multidimensional environmeaants can be used to visualize sound. A reference section includes studio websites and a glossary. (Thames & Hudson)

playZero (2010) by Victor Morales was originally part of an opera called Playzero made at Festspielhaus St. Pölten in June 2010. Music by Wolfgang Mitterer.

Winterreise – Songs & Places (2010) is an exploration of Franz Schubert’s iconic song cycle where different spaces intersect in order to create a new and interesting performance. Real-time visuals generated with video games, surround music based on urban field recordings and Schubert’s Winterreise lyrical part were combined. Winterreise – Songs & Places is a collaboration between Victor Morales (visuals), Ulrike Sowodniok (voice and performance) and Hannes Strobl (Music). (Winterreise – Songs & Places)