Seasoul – Art In Things

the artist and the song “Art In Things”

Vanessa is a singer-songwriter studying in the same university that Essie and I go to. She is a true dreamer, which is always showing in her music. Her lyrics are emotional, relatable and honest.

“Art In Things” describes a world of ordinary things and an ordinary relationship that is special because of  its unforced authenticity and honesty. The beauty lies within the security of the day-to-day, which is often not appreciated enough. Everything does not have to be perfect to be beautiful.

the idea and concept

The music video shows different aspects and levels of a normal loving relationship. We wanted to shine a light on the simplicity of that. The world within gets turned inside out and outer influences are visualized. As a whole, the narrating as well as the performance shots allow an insight into the complex, but recurring facets of a modern love. To show those, we decided to divide all of the shots into three different categories.

nature

This category shows Vanessa´s impressions and feelings. It´s all about self reflection. We show her roaming around in the forest and exploring her surroundings sensuously. At the end of her journey, she finds her “little prince”. She found herself and through that, she found him.

projections and overlays

The expectations that Vanessa could have for love and a relationship are shown in this category as well as interferences that she could have experienced before. We decided to show those things with the help of projections of forces of nature and art by Michelangelo among other things. In this category, the male model does not appear. We wanted to only show Vanessa because her expectations individually tailored to her and her experiences.

neon

This category shows the actual relationship of Vanessa and her partner in all its physical and emotional aspects. Both of them are shown illuminated by red and blue neon lights in front of a black background. The mixture of the cool- and warm-toned lights supports the interplay of distance and closeness that is shown by Vanessa and her “little prince”.

the cast

Beginning this project, we already knew that we wanted Vanessa to play herself in the video – mainly because the song is so personal to her. Casting her male counterpart was a bit more difficult. The most important thing was that the two of them had to get along well. We finally chose her best friend Ollie from New Zealand. He did not only fit the image and look of the male model that we had in mind, but also brought a lot of joy to the shootings.

the styling

The most important part of the styling was for Vanessa to always stay herself. Therefore, I went for neutral makeup looks – only going darker for the neon shots. Her hair was always wild and messy and she was wearing her own jewelry.

Vanessa´s outfits differed in the three categories. While exploring the forest, she wore a very simple white dress that was just short enough to reveal her bare feet allowing the focus to be on the sensual journey even more. For the projection category, we searched for a dress somewhat similar. It should also be white and have the same neckline, but with sleeves making the projections more apparent and with more detailing. Eventually, expectations are more complex than impressions. In the neon category, we wanted her to seem more mature. She wore an all-black look with different structures that reflected the neon lights nicely. This worked out well because the clothes blended in well with the black background and allowed the focus to be on the acting.

With Oli, we went for the classics: a white shirt and light trousers in the nature category, and a black ensemble in the neon category.

the editing

While putting the different clips together, we paid attention to maintain a dreamy and almost nostalgic aesthetic throughout the whole video. We achieved that by using a dynamic way of cutting and using effects as for example overlays. Those were especially important for the nature category. We preferred it to appear less realistic. More obvious overlays create tension and also connect the different categories with each other.