BOOP-OOP-A-DOOP

 

video
year of production: 2003-2004
running time: 5 min. 16 sec.
concept, image, sound collage: Sachiko Hayashi
sound source: Magnus Alexanderson
© sachiko hayashi 2004
thanks: the Experimental Television Center and Nicholas Economos

 

"Boop-oop-a-doop" is an observation and investigation of our daily life and plays with 3 different elements: creation of identity, media culture, and our own desire to be somebody else. By taking up two prominent figures in mass media culture, namely Marilyn Monroe and Betty Boop, the project focuses on how these three elements intermingle with each other, re-enforcing each element each time.

Marilyn Monroe became an icon of the 20th century. She represented sensualism, sweetness and vulnerability, indeed all the characteristics that were and still are recognised as "desirable" for a woman. She is the ultmate female whom both men and women equally adore and idolize; men wish to be with her and women desire to be like her. This "wish/desire" is probably what keeps Marilyn Monroe still "alive" as one of the biggest icons even 40 years after her death.

However, many of her trademarks such as the baby-doll voice, "boop-oop-a-doop" , the skirt being raised by the gust of wind , even her mannerism, were first created by Max Fleischer for his cartoon figure Betty Boop. Thus the question emerges; was Marilyn Monroe a creation of her own or was she a personification of somebody else's desire? In a highly developed media society like ours, where is the line between your own desire and someone else's wish, who creates whom, and what is "self"?

By combining analogue and digital video techniques, "Boop-oop-a-doop" displays complex imagery in which such historical video synthesizers as Paik-Abe's Wobulator, Jones' Colorizer and FairLight are traceable.

"Boop-oop-a-doop" is included in DVD "Personas and Personalities" published by Aspect Magazine, Boston, with a commentary track by the artist/educator Nicholas Economos. "Personas and Personalities" can be purchased from their web site: http://www.aspectmag.com

shown at:

NewFormsFestival '06-TRANSFORMATION, Vancouver, Canada, 2006
"PureScreen" Castlefield Gallery, Manchester, UK, 2006
"Signal Channel" - Echotrope, the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, Nebraska, USA, 2006
"Signal Channe"l - Echotrope, the South Bend Regional Museum of Art, Indiana, USA, 2006
Festival Der Nationen, Linz, Austria, 2006
Festival Images Contre Nature, Marseille, France, 2006
Chicago Motion Graphics Festival,Chicago, USA, 2006
Ongoing Festival, Stuttgart, Germany, 2006
Videoformes, Clermont-Ferrand, France, 2006
Thailand New Media Art Festival, Bangkok, Thailand, 2005
Trampoline in a live-link-event with Berlin, Nottingham, UK, 2005
Detroit International Film and Video Festival, MI., USA, 2005
ENTERmultimediale, Prague, Czech Republic, 2005
International Media Art Biennale, Wroclaw, Poland, 2005
"Obssession" International Audio-Video Art Festival, Gallery X, Istanbul, Turkey, 2005
Reel Venus, Leonard Nimoy Thalia Theater, NYC, USA, 2005
Mad Cat Women's Film Festival, San Francisco, USA, 2005
Not Still Art, Micro Museum NY, USA, 2005
backup festival, Weimar, Germany, 2005
exground filmfest, Wiesbaden, Germany, 2005
eKsperi[m]ento 5 - Festival of Film, Video & New Media, Manilla, the Philippines, 2005
Instants Vidéo numériques et poétiques, Marseill, France, 2005
VAD Video and Digital Arts International Festival, Girona, Spain , 2005
Intermediale 2005, Legnica, Poland, 2005
Östersund Konstvideo Festival, Östersund, Sweden, 2005
Film Fylkingen, Stockholm, Sweden, 2005