In 1997, a lot of interesting pieces of
art were released, this includes the pieces I have chosen, which come
from German artists. The first thing I have chosen is a series of
photos taken for the cover of the album 'Sehnsucht' by Rammstein.
This series of images is by Gottfried Helnwein, and involves a
picture for each member of the band. The second is the music video
for Du Hast, a song off of this same album, directed by Phillip
Stölzl.
The first items I will focus on are the
series of images, created for the fold-out album art for the
'Sehnsucht' album. In each image it shows the member of the band with
some kind of face mutilation, using some kind of metal contraption,
such as one of Schneider with his mouth clamped open with metal. 'The
cover most commonly seen features Till Lindemann with a muzzle and
odd metal objects blocking his view, as they are placed over his
eyes.' (No
Author, http://www.helnwein.com,
No date) These images are dark, and have a horror theme
to them. The second, the video for Du Hast, is a music video, with
the imagery and story based on Reservoir Dogs, the film directed by
Quentin Tarantino.
In both of these pieces, the styles are
pretty similar, both being a neutral and dark palette, with gritty,
almost horrific images. The photography is much more along the horror
path, however, the masks in the music video have an aura of
creepiness about them, by obscuring the upper two thirds of the band
members faces in the first set of clips we see them in. There is a
theme of dark colours running through the two pieces, the only breaks
seeming to be pinks and reds in both of these. This gives a gritty
feel to them, with the photographs taking it further into darkness by
the photoset. The music video uses this to work around the model of
the Reservoir Dogs movie, using a similar kind of palette and uses of
cinematography.
During the music video we see the
character played by the camera view get beaten, which you assume is
to near death, considering the explosion of the containing building
in the end of this video. This relates to the set of pictures through
the imagery of violence, shown through the mutilation of the faces of
the band members, although it is shown much more obviously in the the
set of photos.
The first few shots at the beginning of
this music video expose the end of the video, showing the remains of
the explosion, you can see the shattered glass, and shows the shoes
of the woman we see left by the car before it is blown up. The way
this is presented is a lot less 'in-your-face' when compared to the
photos taken for the album.
Overall, both of these artworks are
running along a similar stream of ideas, due to them being created
for and starring the same band. The both have the creepiness and both
of them have a dark, some would say unpleasant feel about them.
Bibliography
No author, no date.
Available at: http://www.helnwein.com/news/news_update/article_310-RAMMSTEIN-album-Sehnsucht-is-released-with-six-different-covers-by-Gottfried-Helnwein-RAMMSTEIN-album-Sehnsucht-is-released-with-six-different-covers-by-Gottfried-Helnwein;jsessionid=AF4EA67113F08D7E830E72BDA22CE720 (Accessed 30/09/2014)
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