Audiovisual Cultures episode 59 – Personal Film-making with Éanna Mac Cana automated transcript

hello and welcome to the audio visual cultures the podcast exploring arts and cultural production I'm Paula Blair and I'm really happy to be joined this time by Ian McKenna he talks to us by his moving image practice many thanks to membership Petri on dot com forward slash AP cultures for your continued and much appreciated support the podcast is free to access but not to make and distribute they say this into the end to find out more ways to be part of audio visual cultures for now I enjoy the discussion my and I'm gonna so my slash mark great for circa aren't quite as I had the pleasure of Lincoln street quite a lot of your work because you've been putting it on he changed a lot of the work that you had and installations and and film festivals that's really exciting so you've been mostly making short form films so far is that right yeah at the moment I would like to push on to more long form projects not been writing a couple things that are beyond anything I've done so far one of the reasons as a financial our financial because you can only afford so much short forms good for audience attention things like that when you're in the autumn exceptional or if it's online you know people tend to not watch too much for too long especially in the sort of the phones that I like I'm a big fan of slow cinema and that's what and that sort of culture that's a bit more difficult I think then it might be useful to try and get an idea if it seems and she said come through in your work by talking first of all may be a bite when your most recent film set you up loaded so last week he uploaded I read a short animation called screen I find that one really striking visually as well as the audio it's really fascinating we found some debate twenty five seconds it's all right I really love the way you focus on small details and you've got this recurring image of a hydraulic hospital bed space areas and so %HESITATION there's a sense coming three of it you use the shapes of things in their car abstracted but it's so clear what they are you know it's very minimal very pared back but I find it really packs a punch yeah it really conveyed a lot of isolation and it was quite intense but there's also this idea of busy ness and there's a lot of other stuff going on in the signed happy to talk about what it is you're exploring and not screening I sort of hit us like a and then between film from a terms of work lan's love my work I had a film at a while back %HESITATION enactors the bad racism but I'm also I I've written a short film that I sort of had in mind %HESITATION hasn't been made yet but it's close to other sort of static look good screen %HESITATION ready part Bach images I kind of want to choose have a teaser almost have something in mind or were introduced the next short film well I plan to shoot down short film estimated and block light so for me I was kind of just test out different ideas I like to focus on the one detail some some I'm a big fan of Theodor Dreyer's optional Joan of arc in the not so there's a lot of just it's like a bad against double cross got stalled so that sort of thing but was again excellent as well not only on screen but in previous work focusing on the details and %HESITATION singer objects I guess running and to me or what people take away from the previous when needed was it the rectory where specifics in a hospital is that it will migrate G. use of faulty camera for part of it and some of the tech is that right sure is that a different one I used to smoke the camera for the previous one and so in the beginning yeah yeah %HESITATION are you saying comment but I I bought a a number one for right tree vocabulary I used faulty camera soul download Sony small comment it fitted perfectly with the seams of mortality and the LX you know something Dan real I try and find a lot of my work but then withdrew right tray %HESITATION I bought the same coming because I love the last four that's a fact was brilliant and I I'm you know just a local blues like nineties nerds because Arnold films that came out this summer kind of silly but still like them you know like the Blair witch project yeah but I thought maybe aren't on it when I'm on the phone that works fine %HESITATION short amount for a tree news two films that way if you if you're from third thinking about grace the I. losing somebody and he's left behind and how it affects them themes range remembrance and directions you go through when you visit a gray area for around a week %HESITATION I was researching a lot in the last few years then to you know old Irish culture and the culture of this card for an interlock nowadays or if it's just sort of surviving as well %HESITATION interest in high changes over time and that sort of thing about the form the cane and work at it you know can instead of the mouth of the cease so archaic ritual work usually %HESITATION woman will perform it but it kind of died down there's a number of reasons why it doesn't work cups of church work too big of a fond of women home and sort of power quality G. number take place over to say stuff away usually they don't really like the I think there is an association are works for pagan rituals goes back a long way so it was nothing but I had met the in the lead up to a cause try to find someone to perform but eventually turned out to be just coincidence virtual someone speak Irish as well as waters I am not the Armagh Reimers and a member the log treatments Dara he was talking to me about it you know hi it's just a human response really sort of took the dog not study what I was getting out I was trying to there was no like sort of I guess like national sentiment it was just I was really talking about your expression of grief but I will talk to the man well sort of right now from a couple different perspectives sort of controlling but my own history but people you know the possible entrance with a little bit of research about eight point nine years ago and is described as a cry baby on the crying it was this signed it just came from my friend it did not say how a particular there aren't any necessary words to you or if it's just something that emerges the fading that could emerge the sign from the body yeah that's right most of my life I suppose it was like a sort of poem yes but I I did you know one man Francis Quinn what we're working to get her on the shoulder if you're getting into those sort of moments where the words are really coming up yeah you know just kind of like roll with it %HESITATION welcome those kind of conduct as you described in like manner not even just mumbles or you know cries all because Shiro it's electrical work but for the most part it is water going back to work the sort of history of I think there's like a lot of links to the Jewish and our cultures as well so in trucks fascinating what's the point of origin yes %HESITATION yeah yeah it came up actually and %HESITATION previous recording I did with an artist who's also based in Belfast she was born in Iran she was talking about practices that were really quite similar from her parents culture feels something just quite natural about it in a way it's a natural response to something I think visually that one because that's one where I thought the night vision use where it's quite a grain and then you've got these distortions are it's breaking up a lot of my work as well it's kind of just circumstance again with the calmer it was that's faulty common interest students good luck %HESITATION it suited the mood the night vision really the only light up what county that so if you just put a figure against a wall on the extra cost light across her uncle night vision that's great stuff but we can I can be very effective to go alongside the words so and was there might be some like pouches works but if they cannot just recording close we had recorded an accidental theatre that's right Shastri score %HESITATION cars go by so I was still a lot of the coast just to eliminate those so instead of the tween what Francis was Sam it came back around and worked in my favor because it sits commerce talent %HESITATION what she says will expose these things keep reemerging and other pieces so the rag trade one that has the bad images again but you've also got it seems like a young man visiting some sort of memorial and tying a rack on a trade going down the rabbit hole again there were old traditions and cultures for a lot of people still have probably more so than the actors gaining less someone from wells drilled visitor well technically well kept their rights or part of something the baby belongs to a person tie it to the right track selected hope I guess maybe it cools into by a pro or send a message something to someone I guess or something special %HESITATION so I'm so I'm not too sure that's true but there's plenty of holy wells and Arland specially hello source close just because something does on some some of them are just been lost over time as well so myself but this is just nice like simple act of documents on Oct but maybe this time yeah because there's a lot of focus on removing the grant and stay close up action of the hand stepping into water repeatedly it's almost like a cleansing part of the ritual I wonder if it's a failing %HESITATION if we separate from any religious connotation for a moment if it's an active trying to feel like you're doing something when you feel powerless in a situation of somebody isn't while or maybe in the process of dying and you're fading quite helpless about that so you it's there maybe doing something is what helps yeah I think you're right Justin something like simple lock blacked out whatever it may be it doesn't have to be connected to religious or you know it doesn't have to belong to the old Irish culture or anything like that in your state it's just a simple act of going to get someone's some sweets store and bring them to the person who's on world just visit and some of them talking to them structural work here this time you get more directly into the following a young person dating with grace and your fiction film removal that was a longer pay say is that right that you had a quite a few film festivals because again the Irish things are coming up and then to do with one part of it the aftermath lawyer %HESITATION decided some of that and so lot of Irish folk gospel so got it in Dublin that knows what and %HESITATION the contest you here I thank people who were maybe decide not here were able to connect to you know a bit more than what was brought so it's following a young man he seems to have a job as a roommate filled person maybe needs religious icons which manages to accidently damage some of them so there's quite a point it's thank you bye in faith and they act swiftly and stuff so he finds out about his father being taken now and he seems to just know that yeah I'm gonna miss her yeah but yes I see what you mean it by really appreciating so cinema and not it's a very quiet %HESITATION minutes very stale and so when there is action you really notice sets yes it's very considered and that's very internal type of foam nothing that's what I was really traffic across all like I think the average shot length and removal is quite long some shots that go on programs and kind of wild I guess for a short song yeah I was looking at a lot of collects in them %HESITATION I'd watch a lot of care star means work right now all right excellent I was also a hem that makes sense because there's quite a lot of journeying on roads and %HESITATION then remain so yeah that yeah yes run scheme where but said she found that one Armonk with a twist on that it was good from the Americans just not many people except in the roads and stuff yes Iran's held nearby that mom so that's a big part of the film yeah there's a woodland it's very K. E. N. N. he received something suddenly happens because he sort of just runs away from it the main character and then later on after time as possible after the way the main character is played by transaction he %HESITATION return slots for %HESITATION I guess it's like a appreciation for what it means and it went away you know you get like when places hold such meaning to sometimes fall for me at least I don't really hold any resentment or bitterness towards them I just kind of look at them and that's what the main character does so there is a better route right I wrote as well as a sort of big wave at the burgers when he returns he sees a communication tower and I was kind of Lincoln and %HESITATION earlier in the film or some %HESITATION so I was trying to pick up some from there I wasn't too sure what exactly transaction isn't comparable isn't because see it or feel it so it does feel like a lot of your films are trying to work through things do you feel that that's how your filmmaking is is just trying to work through things here especially the short films as well and part of the cane and someone to find the right in the car I guess they're just releases of you know what I want for in hospital I've been talking about the steps she frowns on stocks as well bush will make and it's a bit more difficult for me to find a release and settlement because it's not really about being creative when you're all set you have to get the job done film and %HESITATION and parts of that again for me are I don't really find a creative release the more maybe I'd like to write that sort of thing you know I think for the farmers they can go on stage and get that instant release boardwalk tractors or people are like expressing cells but also making nothing it's only when you're maybe writing or doing some smoke from a I find a release not since the tools to get it done yeah yeah I think there's no room for emotional so you kind of just need to get the job done at least if you're still short films I produce all of them as well I wish I didn't have to books maze runner online get a job it'll probably really important practical experience though because hopefully that sets you up if you want to expand and not sort of career because you are so very young you've got options and for what area you want to do because you're ready multi skilling at the moment with I have to remind myself up thank you you know when you're taking on the rails for a lot of the toxicity obviously learned a lot about that's good experience and I try and removal was a it was a tough shit I felt at the time I hadn't done a good enough job directing the things about but I guess just kind of part you know I suppose if you're if you're have a death spiral the house at the same time then realistically you know and you're very young film maker and it is a very difficult job today so to have me at at seventeen minute film doing about much of the work by yourself at your age that's pretty impressive in itself I mean unless they have seen worse I'm not damning it with faint praise it's a good phone but you know I've seen a lot worse buying more professional people so don't put yourself behind don't be hard on yourself I think all of us or at our whole lives are always constantly learn and it's good to be there to get things to go well I can do better I will do better next time because you know happened any mistakes but not that you made mistakes it's a really tight found fascist more just accept that you're young and you're gaining experience and you're doing it really well so there's a heart to take from what you're doing and it's very brave to do a lot of the same since well because you're looking at things that are quite mature for your age I think your generation are quite an interesting correct because he might have some more maturity because of things going on in your life so that people just a few years old and you might not have so I'm quite interested to learn about what's going on is people your age at the moment in there for a year at a time I what's going on I'm in my own little world whatever yeah like a lot of people my age are color to your name and stuff and I just kind of trying to figure it out I thank the detail a lot of people obviously comes with a lot of pressure on banks adding different people figured out I don't think any of this really truly figure it out just to survive he just couldn't hurry I think anybody ever says a good little sauce diet thing that probably lion to be honest you're asking me about a film education having been a content provider and thirty comments for some education and having had a background of film education he told me before that your son medication the center up to this because of health issues right you're going three year periods it seems to me from the right side of self educating and just staring at me in learning by doing it as far to say before I worked for al Qaeda back I went to Manchester for yeah twenty six and twenty seven ten studies from working there but before that I was making phone Burke I didn't even amidst a skill and I made films outside about and then %HESITATION yeah I came back and was in hospital for but I don't know I guess I just pop my color blinded by it you started filming and I sort of had these images from my house so I started to look back on capital C. phone services will soon I guess I've got experience from me I've definitely learnt the most just a muscle do you wonder hi the experiences compare it was clear heart broken in a way when I was teaching and I taught briefly at the university of Salford probably at the same time that you remind Chester yeah and I was a theory person attached to a a new film production degree you know we had so many excited radiant Tasiast sick young people the old one and three directors producers cinematographers so last and tell them they're probably at the end of your degree you'd have to go in as a runner anyway because it's not your discounts tracking yeah you know I always wondered about just the aspects of that that your film production education that's formalized an institutionalized because I worry that a lot of young people are going into it thinking that they're going to come right straight away B. in Tarantino or whatever ironically because he's not allowed to give those old phone apart from going to cinema and I feel like that's what's lacking is they're not going to the cinema they're just watch and stuff your TD which is fine but then thinking they're going to move to Hollywood or something when they're finished %HESITATION it's not very realistic so just wondering if what you're experiencing you're still in the middle of it so we're finding ice but yeah if you know your different experiences just gotten in there and just stay in it anyway I have good experience of my course managing what I go back in the I remember %HESITATION of course later said at the start of the collection phones good summer that was my mobile you know because I go to settle I watch a lot of that is I watch a lot of phones that's a big ass character you mention card you know he he worked in the TV rental store for years but I just watched like carrentals numbers or talks with watching films but part of it for me I guess some people go into unity I'm not gonna make excellent courses because they don't really know exactly what they want to be a generalist maybe some people are going to not work but A. S. film industry is a bit of a tricky one because again as you're saying it's like you graduate from a soul mate control but you're still going to have to take up an entry level and the film industry unless you called the connection to the ground I don't think people read enough about what the course entails they usually set up the course detailed enough before after it so you'll know what you're sort of getting into but I think people don't pay much attention and there's a lot of pressure school you need generally not just whistle that can you know look you gotta get out on your life and then further down the road that can cause a lot of problems it was that it is free for one moment we were in office he wants to direct this is when I was at Manchester I was surprised how many people didn't put their hands up you know I just take as a given the people up at the moment and course and direct short souls but a lot of people I guess maybe didn't know yet or maybe their trusted server settings what we're there to make films and stuff but there's a lot of farmers just yeah there's a huge amount today I think life experiences probably in a way more useful or been educated in other areas can be more useful as but I'm hearing on this and other podcasts that have a lot of people he fell foul kinds of production roles and it's just so fascinating the amount of different things the point of different expertise that goes into making one program or one found sharks I worked in our department for over so many different departments and crazy and journal folks a lot of moving parts so yeah there's a lot going on you'd be surprised special music productions check out the E. at the moment do you have to hustle for work is it a combination of your own projects and working for other people there how does that work for you at the moment so my heart was working in the art department in the summer well so my eyes and I like that little bit of the Jewish nocturnal wish the how to a more steady job or I wish that I called paid for what I want to do so much I don't really make too much money off my own phones are covered contact it's like production designer so that work for him usually you'll swing up sparkles I'm sorry I kind of just want to focus on my own thing but then I got side tracked I need a bit of money as well I'm hoping maybe script almost study job I guess but I'd like to do something in around what I'm interested in the is it okay to ask if I if this whole time he's gonna Seuss's the short documentary he's done with the artists Sharon Kelly he's got I think it's today they were recording at her expressions opening and the golden tried to gallery because it is an investor moments while the reason for the phone and her work is pretty stunning as well yeah it is she's done a great job they're not talking about you just came out of nowhere I came back from I had a residency in Hong Kong I came back from there talk with my mom about her show and stuff and I just sort of the idea and vision make some for southern %HESITATION started piecing together the show looks great my own such a going beyond our so she's such a big influence on the slim %HESITATION so it's nice to just make some four nine it was a free what's not because what she's doing is she's drawing in charcoal on translation papers so you get the sense of a delicatessen and circles just sitting on the paper it could slide off at any moment so sense of hate to have to go to it is to work with these very delicate materials and so thank you very any picked up and the camera work you've got a lot of different focal ranges going on around me for it you just recapture that precarity through the proximity the close ups and everything else going on three different lancers I have a fifteen on third and six and then I sort of rain just to work with so my mom still some really interesting things with Celtics all the work you know in terms of the medium she's working on connects to the subject matter of memory and you know I fraudulent so much of the work is I've been stolen right out of sorry right yeah and then bump stocks in there every five minutes as well so its rating of a subject matter because that's really into her own childhood is not what happens after this old place but there's something very tenuous by thought for memory that she seems to have been there's photographs made in a play I guess what a lot of my mom's records contemplate of offense I think she's going to leave however bucked and usual major bustled through these images to she found her child so she doesn't want to talk with articulate and events serious amounts of school or work as well with respect to the cut it should be treated as she speaks related to grief and silence of the truck made a specific source of inspiration doctors well you know she did your cheatin automation these are things I look to as well as references and grown up or under my daughter's focus on Nordic stirs I think it just kind of rubs off on June I'll look at things but if you're going about a project or visually Allah I'll I think there's a lot of lost an entrance from them on holiday compose events on paper or on the complex do you want to sending about the residency then in Hong Kong something very exciting S. R. four months months ago I applied because I was on the go away somewhere on my phone well I might as well do something with the rest and so on to look at and what's going to start a year pretty much for us Tomlin residents in Hong Kong and then %HESITATION over somewhere things just kind of started with capital murder so it's kind of interesting going into the you know because I wasn't I I wasn't aware of what was going to happen in Hong Kong and I wasn't really too public I guess at the time when I applied yeah I'm not alone to the phone call so it wasn't too bad to be honest but it was just sent trucks to be there at that time this is the time when there's major protests happening yeah I was there for the month of October and %HESITATION straits clan on the flight over I had just finished up by one round I'm not sold by the individual gets the collective a lot of them arrived into this place where people are fighting for their individual rights the same thing but you can so sort of big box it was very Allah cart make together what is your residency entail fun I wrote a script for bisexual myself right now and then I made some installation work about how to show that they're studying cold flu projects so I had to show that are accepted my video work you know what I just thought Hyundai controlled everything to a different expression titled that was just made up of these plaster cost plastic cups that collected while I was in hospital nurses with public schools thanks to them your tech tomorrow over the course of cost us to start collecting the I. cost those and made a split bad I'm just laid out on the floor I kind of disconnected from although I was like a spectator took what was going on in Hong Kong I didn't really want that so I wasn't interested enough so I I didn't really lucked out interfere with what I was doing to be honest with the video work and the installation again it kind of falls along to where I am creatively I can really well maybe outside forces made their way and and I didn't realize what the instruction book from A. I. this was to do with myself there was no room for me in Florence from what's happened in the old call because you you know a young person he's been through quite an ordeal that's a lot to work three and itself yeah yeah I find myself in my head a little yeah and there's an overwhelming amount of stuff going on in the world in general at the minute so it's really difficult to start getting ready and entrances and I agree and caring about one thing a lot of but all the other millions of things going on so it that's not a bad thing to be introspective Eric's sister overwhelming to them as well so I don't really know what's going on in the world I guess it's always been our best but when you go free I guess something traumatic and then you come out the other side you're not going to run you almost think the world will be peaceful but that doesn't just keep scrolling do you think you trying to find some sort of peace and yourself maybe it's not as active as possible yeah I guess I would like to thank thank most car helped me last year almost like a delay strengths are and what happened when I was in the hospital and I think things really struck me last year and I almost became a worked out towards the end when I came back to Hong Kong in Hong Kong where we can reach you that's great until residents need seem to have been doing quite well that getting your working savages and Belfast another but beyond this file is fortunate because I Peter Butler's Michael sabar trump he runs the %HESITATION password yes or a no time I got out of hospital and these videos to kind of want to do something with them right shoot for a few days and it scored one of his on court street none I thought to be honest I was kind of down the thought you know it was just it was a nice way of wrapping it up but then I don't remember too much of what happened but I I was able to get the crescent only a few months after on I did like a complete new body of work pretty much within two months and that was the homework in the king and %HESITATION I was running a cold front that after a committee it should come scratch you know I really like your work so that's frustrating because I'm trying to push things on them it's been difficult to get shown criticism thank installations with a lot of hard graft and patience keep at it and see how it goes we've done quite a lot and quite a short space of time Stampy pace with fast do you feel like you're exploring a sense of a connection to the Irish nicer Irish I tend to say because it feels like this is a question that's come up in a broader sense with people I think mostly because of what's going on lasts for accents after the referendum a few years ago and I feel like a lot of people from the north from north in Ireland from Ulster are reassessing their identity because I know I certainly have in the past few years I was just wondering if in a very personal sense because there is so much that we we've talked about it but CPOs practices that could be considered as traditional Irish practices but what a friend does that mean and %HESITATION what kind of direction you know there's a lot of question marks that come up from that but I just wondered if he had any thoughts on that or if that was part of what you were working through as well it is a great way to get it kind of brings back to what we're talking about earlier and that idea of human response to grief and relation to the king and I work under my Irish title and there's a lot of fiber strains from it are just human responses %HESITATION she came and things and I think that's what they should pay to be on a motor history works Gaelic culture these are just things that people go deal thanks I think to make it to you I'm not speaking about you I'm speaking generally to make a political is the wrong thing to the yeah that's fine I don't really think politics and identity in terms of my work ethic I don't really think about it too much at the moment I'm just kind of worked in truth my sort of demons %HESITATION trial almost get food %HESITATION there are locked there was just one of my friends after all but both techs society and %HESITATION I say it does make its way into your work one way or another I guess I'm speaking about hospital environment maybe something can be said about the lock of baths or things like that too and I chose them I think they always find their way in some parts but I don't really see doctor at political message I'm trying to send them through its an idea in a way maybe you have to renegotiate things with your own body because socks at the last count of what you were surprised when second impact said started because that was the first to be offensive what's yesterday this screen and it just struck me some action images of a and the signs of a shaky have status made just five cents of that isolation in a very busy environment I thought about that but I guess there's a contrast from Stalin do you have anything you want to plug is there anywhere on the internet you would like to direct people if they want to see your work the website and I maintain dot com but I think I'm going to be changed not sent yet somebody you should probably if you're older yeah to search for your name and it's crazy to find great SCO it's been really brilliant here for me to hear more about your work I run the query to say and how you work progresses thanks for optimal thank you very good luck with everything and get a her exhibition you've been listening to audio visual cultures it's me Paula Blair and my very special guest in the McKenna this episode was recorded edited and produced by polar bear the music is common ground by our tune licensed under creative Commons noncommercial three point zero license and is available for dine note on C. C. mixer dot org if you like what we do please help us make production and distribution costs with a regular payment to never pay dot com forward slash P. EA Blair or make one off donations to pay pal dot me forward slash PDA prior episodes are released every other Wednesday subscribe in your chosen app so you never miss a new release and do you remember that our backlog of episodes is all available on each tape visit audio visual culture shock wordpress dot com our fellow AT cultures politics on Instagram and eighty cultures on Twitter and Facebook for more information and useful links thanks so much for us then and catch you next time