Pony Nadsat - A Clockwork Orange

You might be wondering what in the world "Pony Nadsat" means.
In this context, "pony" means "to understand" in the Nadsat language, a dialect from the imagination of Anthony Burgess - the author of A Clockwork Orange.  The vast majority of Nadsat is actually influenced by the Russian language.  "Pony" is based off of the Russian word "ponimat," which also means "to understand."  Thus, the title is simply "To understand Nadsat."



In Art and Technology class, we watched numerous clips from A Clockwork Orange, the 1971 film adaptation of Burgess' book (which was written in 1962).  The violent beat-up scenes didn't affect me too much - maybe I'm desensitized - but the rape scene certainly did.  Alex DeLarge, the main character, even sang "Singin' in the Rain" while he and his 'droogs' (Russian word meaning 'close friends') tortured the couple whose house they had invaded.  It was disturbing to watch someone take so much pleasure in humiliating and violating another in such a way, but that just goes to show how much of a turn the teenage society had taken during the nineteen years between 1952 when "Singin' in the Rain" came out and 1971 when A Clockwork Orange was released.

The large distinction between teenagers and adults in A Clockwork Orange  is also emphasized through the use of Nadsat.  The dialect is used only by the teenagers, separating them from the adults who don't understand it.  This makes the teens feel as though they surpass the adults and are on a higher level, which provides an interesting contrast to the fact that some of the Nadsat words are very childlike and immature.  Nadsat vocabulary isn't only influenced by Russian, however - Burgess also made up words himself with a few German additions as well as Cockney rhyming slang.

Burgess knew that if he wrote A Clockwork Orange in the typical language of the day, his book would be unable to keep up with the constantly-changing modern English language.  Creating Nadsat was the solution, because its words would never become old over time.  Each new reader or viewer of the film would discover it as something they had never encountered before, and that was exactly what Burgess wanted.

The Beginning of Film

One of the first science fiction films ever released was A Trip to the Moon, a short silent film directed by Georges Méliès in 1902.  It's about a group of astronomers who arrive on the moon and encounter the moon's strange inhabitants, even capturing one in their swift escape back to Earth.
A Trip to the Moon might seem comical with its low-quality special effects, but despite what we are capable of producing in modern times, the effects in that movie are incredible for being released so long ago! It provided the first stepping stone in the path leading to the amazing things that are created today.



Just as A Trip to the Moon set in motion the sci-fi genre and the production of special effects and animation, The Great Train Robbery, released in 1903 and directed, written, and produced by Edwin S. Porter, started the typical Western movie plotline that would be used again and again in the future. The bandits and the gunfights would make many more appearances in later movies, since the themes present in The Great Train Robbery would become very popular.

Both films don't seem nearly as impressive as movies released today, but the sheer amount of work, time, and effort that went into making the films appear as they do is just astounding to me. For example, most of the prints were hand-colored! Can you imagine spending hours and hours on coloring every single detail for each frame? Somehow they managed, and I believe their hard work was absolutely worth it.

Stop Motion Animation

I have always admired and been fascinated by stop motion animation.  The huge amount of time and effort that is put into such productions astounds and inspires me, and watching them makes me want to create my own someday.  I love the vibe I get from these animations - the noticeably jerky movements and flickers remind me of an old movie.

The embedded video is a stop motion animation I found called "Sweet Dreams" by Kirsten Lepore.  It follows the life of a cupcake who likes to build.  The cupcake's home is filled with sweets - both the building materials and the area's inhabitants.  The cupcake crafts a boat and sails across an ocean and ends up stranded on an island.  However, the cupcake discovers that there are more individuals living there, and learns that the buildings there are made of carrots and other vegetables.  The inhabitants are healthier foods too.  After the cupcake sails back home on a sailboat crafted by the island fruit- and veggie-people, there is a horrible flood that destroys the buildings made of sweets. The cupcake had been given carrot seeds and planted them earlier, and was able to build a carrot tower to save the sweets-people. From then on, all the buildings were made of vegetables.

I'm not sure what the message was exactly for this animation, if there was one at all, but besides a particular scene involving the cupcake and the cupcake's lover, I would totally use this to teach children that they should eat vegetables instead of sweets because the vegetables were shown to be the better choice.

Abelardo Morell

Upon first visiting the photographer Abelardo Morell's website, I was immediately drawn to the linked text titled 'Alice in Wonderland.'  That story has always been one of my absolute favorites and has often provided inspiration for me in the past, so I was very curious to see what Morell had done with it.  I was delighted to see the pictures he'd taken!  The black and white gave the photo collection a certain eeriness that many old tales have.  I loved how the cutouts of the characters as well as the position of the books made it seem like the story was coming alive, and that the characters were jumping off the pages into reality.

Blackface and Racism

When prejudice against the blacks was still very prevalent decades ago, minstrel shows were a form of entertainment for Americans.  These shows were stage performances that usually consisted of blackface, which was when white actors would paint themselves so they would resemble a black person.  Not only would they visually appear to be black, but they would over-emphasize their mannerisms and accent based on observations from actual black people, including slaves.  Their acting was dramatic to make a parody out of the black character they were portraying, but was considered entertaining and normal at the time.  Despite that, I find that it was really racist, and wouldn't be any less offensive if it was repeated in modern times.



Well... I found out that someone did do a modern blackface: Die Antwoord.  I had never heard of them before seeing this video, which was unsettling for me.  I found it pretty offensive, with the female rapper as a blackface but sporting animalistic eyes.  To me, this possibly symbolized how black people are not as 'developed' as the rest of us, and are more like animals.  Racism is not yet exterminated from society, so including blackface in something today like Die Antwoord did, especially in such an uncivilized manner, just isn't acceptable in my opinion.

Opera in Pop Culture

Perceptual vigilance is when the mind starts noticing something everywhere after learning about it. For example, now that I've watched and learned about opera in Art and Technology class, I'm realizing that it's in so many things! Opera is actually incorporated into many commercials or videos and movies in modern times, most often to have a dramatic effect or put emphasis on something.





When I searched for commercials that had opera in them, I was surprised to see numerous ones that I'd already seen before. I just had never put enough thought into them to realize that opera was such an important component in conveying whatever message the advertisement was showing. The embedded video above is one of the few commercials that I always found entertaining, but I was only ever entertained. I never thought deeper about the use of opera in the ad, until now.

Madama Butterfly; an Animation by Pjotr Sapegin

This animation starts off on a positive note, showing the love Madama Butterfly and the American sailor have for each other. When he sails off, she loyally waits for his return, although the stormy weather and darker colors suggest a happy ending may not be in her future.

I loved how the baby that results from her union with the sailor starts off as a fish in a bowl that is her belly, because that symbolized the oceanic nature of the father's job as a sailor and I found it very creative. Unfortunately, Madama Butterfly's happiness is short-lived.

After her baby grows a little as time passes, her lover returns to the island at last, only to show up with another woman and snatch away the child. As the umbilical cord tying mother to child is severed by the sailor, I could sense Madama Butterfly's physical and emotional agony as she is separated from her lover and baby. The sailor drives away - just as he had stolen and broken her heart, he stole the child and broke the bond they could've had.

In her despair, Madama Butterfly rips off her skin and reveals her wire armature, reflecting the surge of raw emotion being brought to the surface, before deconstructing her individual metal pieces. I didn't expect her to actually destroy herself in such a manner, and watching her do so was both morbidly fascinating and almost frightening.

I was left feeling empty and sad once the animation ended, but immediately replaced those feelings with relief that I have such a loving family. This video will certainly stay with me, because the knowledge that Madama Butterfly's life ended in the hopeless, helpless way that it did is haunting, and Pjotr Sapegin portrayed that excellently.