22/10/2020
Critical Newspaper Collage
In this lecture, we looked at critical thinking and were given a collage task - Ebony and I paired up and came up with this as a final image. Below are my individual contributions; Rishi is now a catboy, and a medical miracle sparks conflict in these new parents' neighbourhood.
Music Video Theoretical Analysis
Childish Gambino - Sweatpants
Theory
One could look at this video using an existential gaze, through how Glover is disillusioned and frustrated by the people around him all sharing his body. It can be interpreted that he wishes to meet the gaze of another and have a moment of existential clarity, but all he can see is himself. This video represents how his life has become consumed by his own image, thereby suggesting that he’s in fact desperate for an escape from subjectivity. ‘Sweatpants’ subverts the existentialist gaze through conceptual and performative techniques, revealing a person who feels doomed to be constantly wrapped up within themselves, be this due to carrying a celebrity status, unresolved personal issues, rumination and anxiety, etc. Trapped in a repeating diner sequence in which his surroundings increasingly mirror him illuminates us on the way his self-centred cognition creeps up on him, his experience in the world growing narrower and desire to be perceived, rather than simply looked at. Structurally, the camera following Glover throughout the whole video gives a sense of heightened subjectivity, subverting the existentialist notions of self-awareness and phenomenological acknowledgement. In this way, the video could be said to adopt a solipsist philosophy, the very theory that Sartre aimed to discredit. This would imply that the video is the ultimate subversion of the existential gaze.
Key Points
0:48 - The first instance we see something off or surreal in the extras’ performances - a group of diner customers move their heads synchronously to the beat of the non-diegetic song, which we had insofar assumed audible only to Glover. This suggests that he is not sharing his experience with other people; they are sharing his experience with him.
1:57 - Upon going outside the second time round, the vomiting man and one half of the couple making out have both turned into Glover, wearing their original costumes. Glover looks around, confused, and re-enters the diner to start the sequence again. This time, everyone has taken his form and is staring at him - absently at best, judgingly at worst. He moves awkwardly and nervously, clearly uncomfortable at the attention, which could be a metaphor for the celebrity lifestyle he’s been recently introduced to. Even his table party looks back at him with his own eyes; he is aware of them, but they are him, and it does not adequately substitute true introspection.
2:30 - Glover shouts “I don’t give a f*ck about my family name,” and the diner goes still while the song goes quiet momentarily. Since the surrounding diner-goers all technically share his family name (considering they have become him), we see how he creates a pall of tension in the shot as it widens. Now towards the end of the video, we see a continuous shot panning in a circular motion, revolving outwards onto the uncanny scene where everyone in the diner is Glover, insinuating that he feels mentally incapable of developing a self-reflective consciousness. The video ends with Glover dancing fluidly in a dark forest, indicating that he has learned to accept this way of life.
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