The two topics I discussed were “The Medium is the Message” and “The Mask You Live in”. My main point when discussing The Medium is the Message was how I would often find myself focusing less on telling a story and more on pushing myself to experiment with different mediums. My first (and personal favorite) project I referenced when discussing this was a project I had been working on this past semester.
The images above are still shots of a short story where a small, curious creature comes to life in the digital world and breaks out into the real world seeking fortune. I cut myself some slack on the story because that was not meant to be the focal point of the animation. The piece was meant for me to test myself. I wanted to experiment in multi-media, namely 2D animation over live action. And despite the narrative of the piece falling short, I was content with the quality of the animation.
I also dabbled in a code-based art program called Processing two years ago. Despite myriad frustrations with the program itself, I always enjoyed the end product. The image shown below was created in a drawing program I created within Processing. The idea was that every time I pressed my tablet pen down on my tablet, a random shape, with a random color and random size, would display and follow the cursor. This way, I would have no idea what I was working with until I started the piece, forcing me to go with the flow and not plan too far ahead.
Before I enrolled in Alfred State’s animation major, I studied architecture. I wasn’t happy with this major at all and only stuck with it to make family members happy and because I let other people tell me what they wanted me to do. This was the Mask I Lived in for several years. After one particular semester in which the stress from architecture had gotten too overwhelming, I made a spur-of-the-moment decision to switch majors into animation. This was what made me happy. The piece below was meant to reflect my feelings while in architecture. I desperately tried holding onto both my obligations in architecture while also holding onto the things that made me happy. This eventually began to tear me apart at the seam because I felt like I was being given an ultimatum. Continue with architecture or abandon it and pursue my own passions. I went with the latter on account of being here and writing this now.
My goal while enrolled in this major has always been to try new things and explore new mediums while also staying true to myself and my own drive to improve. I’m due to graduate this winter. My goal for the future is to use my time after graduating to explore and discover new, unorthodox ways of making art and staying true to my passion.
Michael Vokianoskovitch 