Otino Corsano: 2011

Happiness – Part 1

2011

p|m Gallery

1518 Dundas Street West

Toronto, Ontario M6K 1T9

November 3 – 26, 2011

A collection of images culled from online social media sites was the starting point for Otino Corsano’s latest project: Happiness – Part 1.

To further study these found, frozen images, Corsano carefully rendered these moments of repose as ink drawings. His experience as a freelance storyboarder influenced the decision to reproduce the original images as quick ink sketches, preparing them for further expansion into video. The storyboard drawings are organized into three sets of sixteen images each.

Prominent commercial film directors were each provided with one set of drawings in order to reproduce the art stills as moving scenes. The three 30-second “commercials” were produced by: Caroline Ryan, Jessica Adams and Peter Darley Miller (Editor: Ting Poo). Composer John Mark Sherlock provided the supernatural, ambient score for each video. Accordingly, the work comprising Happiness – Part 1 progresses Corsano’s practice of collaborating with professional, commercial creatives to produce his art.

The first digital source material is transformed through a double process of interpretation. Drawn as light pictures of enjoyment, they are suspended further as lingering moving images. The resulting art videos have the look and feel of contemporary lifestyle advertising without a visible product. Happiness is freed from purchase.