I’ve decided that I’m going to run a monthly Artist Spotlight blog series so that I can keep my feet firmly planted in the creative world. The first artist I’d like to talk about is:
KEVIN WEIR
The Ruins of Roebling’s Works – Kevin Weir
Monty Python Animated gif – Terry Gilliam
Kevin Weir is an Art Director for Drogo5 in New York City, who takes old archival photographs and transforms them into animated gifs. His work is very reminiscent of Terry Gilliam’s work on Monty Python, but thanks to Photoshop, Weir manages a subtlety missing from Gilliam’s manual masterpieces.
The Flux Machine project began life as a digital media exercise and as a way to pass the time between semesters at VCU Brandcentre, where Weir was studying for a Masters. Now, attracting up to 50,000 visitors a day, his website The Flux Machine showcases an online gallery of weird, wonderful and sometimes downright spooky animated archive photos. He sources his photographs from the Library of Congress, and spends a few hours, sometimes even a few days looking at them to discover their stories. They become snapshots of time, in a way like no other, showcasing a narrative you wouldn’t expect to find in such photos.
Weir has also developed his techniques for his work, now often including traditional methods and more photography. One of his more famous and eerie pieces – “French 42cm gun” was created using 80-100 drawn frames in photoshop, whereas his “Princess Julianna”piece was created by burning a copy of the photo, recording the process and feeding it back into the animation.
“Princess Juliana”
“French 42cm gun”
Weir’s inspiration comes from the books he read growing up, particularly H P Lovecraft, and the quality of the photos. He doesn’t force a story onto an image, but allows it to reveal itself to him. There is definitely something about these photographs that makes them work as gifs, whereas photos from our time and culture wouldn’t work in the same way. The photos he uses captures just that moment in time, and nothing else. We know nothing about Juliana, or why the soldier was standing next to the gun. We don’t know where these photos were taken or with what context – we can’t tell that just by looking at them, but today’s photos tell a different story. You can tell who the people are, context, emotion, where it was taken, when and every little thing about those people. The photos both Weir and Gilliam use are shrouded in mystery.
Gilliam’s animations are a little more humorous, odd and sometimes slightly unnerving in comparison to Weir’s, after all, they were mainly used in the Monty Python show. Weir’s animations tell splintered stories, and you can easily spot his Lovecraft influences. My particular favourite animation is the ‘Ruins of Roeblings works’, which shows a bombed building shrouded in smoke and mist. Out of the mist walks four alien machines – very reminiscent of The War of the Worlds (the Jeff Wayne version), in particular the scene where everyone is just going about their daily lives whilst the aliens are building their fighting machines. It’s subtle, eerie and yet fits the image perfectly.
I discovered Weir’s work whilst browsing through Tumblr one day. Whilst his work is often opinion dividing and downgraded thanks to the popularity of Gilliam’s work, I find myself respectful and admiring of both. Art is not original – people take ideas and techniques from each other all the time. What matters is how you inject a little bit of yourself into the work, and Weir has successfully done that.
Paper Scribbles Illustration 
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