Aditi S

Some intuitive watercolour and oil pastel sketches to start the process of making:

Reality as a fever dream

As I waited for a rickshaw on the Khirkee main road by the Sai Baba Mandir, on the edge of the street leading towards Khoj, a man appeared out of the usual traffic at the juncture ahead on a horse. He wears an Avengers hoodie, like a superhero; he crosses the street, disappearing into the urban village, perhaps on a mission.

As I sit in the rickshaw, going to the Siri Fort Sports Complex, I see a boy riding an electric motorbike, swerving through traffic using one hand and eating murmura out of a clear plastic bag with his other hand. No helmet on. His snack hangs from a hook below the scooter dashboard. I notice him again after a few minutes, across the road, past the divider, where there is no traffic. He drives at a reckless speed, headphones on, nodding his head to the beats. I imagine he is listening to Addison Rae.

A massive Indian flag waves in slow motion in the distance as I make my way to therapy, again sitting in a rickshaw.

There are some EV charging stations, but they looked abandoned and broken, defunct already. They look as if they came from a sci-fi dystopia, a picture of a dilapidated space station. The air quality index reads 400, but we all know it is more than that.

As I go home, I see a huge billboard advertising a construction company. It is a simple ad, a forehead of a man wearing an unmistakable red cap, it reads ‘Make India Greater Again!’ I’m not sure if it was meant to be funny, but the message landed clearly.


Reflection: A lot of these observations were made either sitting in a rickshaw or waiting for one. It is my most often used mode of transport, and how I relate to the geography of most Indian cities, and perhaps the only time I'm paying attention to my surroundings.

Visuals for Dream Mixtape 2.0: 10 x 2-minute videos in a YouTube playlist:

- A flower opening and closing - in stop motion or slow motion
- Someone walking through the streets as if being followed, they are wearing a wig of long hair and sunglasses, a tight leather skirt and knee-high boots.
- Security camera footage from different cities.
- Mumbai train videos
- A burning flower (lotus)
- Pune in the 80s/90s - archival footage
- Mumbai beach then and now.
- Snake, trains, fireflies, caves - emblems of time
- Car crashes: one video of only one car crash in slow motion
- Scenes from Alice Notley's Descent of Alette (scans below) 

Some questions for the audio:

- What do you dream about usually? What are some aspects of your dream that you are able to grasp organically?
- What has happened with you recently that has felt like a dream? An absurd moment, perhaps?
- When you dream, how do you experience your environment? What types of environments do you usually find yourself in? Are there any dreams you would like to share that explain it?
- Do you perceive time in your dreams? If yes, how so?
- How do you perceive time as a concept or as a presence in your reality?
- Do you feel as if your dreams are real or will become real?

Loose narrative for the video / short story:

One person living in two timelines has recollections both in memory and in documented proof of both timelines. Contained in a week.

Notes after feedback:

Pace of editing,
Static to faster shorts

Rickshaw, scooter video could create a fever dream

Stanley Kubrick - eyes wide shut - New York scenes

Collective dream - consensus of reality

Other writing and reflections of similar moments of time - big shifts in reality for people - Egyptian revolution
Hong Kong protest
Soviet Union fall

Collective opposite

Collective numbing
Slow frame rate

Wong kar cai camera setting
Slowed down - frantic sequence
60fps

Music log - references tonalities
Notes on feelings so that it is easier with a collaborator

Edit to three main concepts

Notes/ideas after watching 2046:

- When Miss Wang breaks up with the Japanese man in the beginning, distorted glass shots, light rippling through glass
- Shot of shoes, walking around, Miss Wang speaking to herself
- Tight frames, upper half of the body
- 'Sample' the train animation
- Opera music in the playlist (?)
- Dreaming, writing fiction, backdrop of the riots - 2046 is the space, the train, the last year Hong Kong is autonomous
- Sudden moments of silence and slow motion
- warm green colour grading
- 1:32:00 - Wang and Chow eating together, distortion through the lens creating layering of imges - double vision
- 1:34:00 - Wang's face reflection off of the window of a moving train
- Iron grails (?)

Notes for filming:

- Connaught Place circles - turns - which will be looping (filmed?)
- Walking from across the Barakhamba Road at the hexagonal-shaped building (flowers in hand?)(roses?)
- Hailey Road, Hailey Lane, turn around the corner, looping
- Security camera footage of deer
- Footage of deer at Deer Park
- Sitting at a cafe (diner style)
- Rickshaw setting - sitting on the side - sunset time ? - tight upper body frame, body in half of the frame to the right (filmed)
- Jahapanaha forest with full cheetah fit, video taken with a security camera
- Walking around the terrace wearing the pony hair boots

Three main concepts: 

1. Commute(ing)

2. Freedom in/of dreams
2.1 Fear of

3. Love/erotics (shame)

References | Readings, Films, Music:
- Revolution: An Intellectual History by Enzo Traverso
- Lover's Discourse by Roland Barthes
- The Descent of Alette by Alice Notley
- Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema by Laura Mulvey
- The Inner World of Daydreaming by Jerome L. Singer
- Headaches by Vegyn
- 2046 by Wong Kar Wai
- Weird Times by Yuri Pattinson
- Sex Appeal of the Organic - Max Perinola
- Fetishism and Curiosity - Laura Mulvey
- How to Remember Your Dreams by Amr Ezzat

to do: 
- Read Revolution: An Intellectual History by Enzo Traverso
- Read Lover's Discourse by Roland Barthes - notes on how it is arranged - Personal and then broader
- Get a digital PDF and mark out the sections tabbed in The Descent of Alette by Alice Notley, and go over them again: record those pages
- Read The Inner World of Daydreaming by Jerome L. Singer

to do: 
- continue writing the two timelines short story
- write a short story about the pari waterfall
- edit deer park footage
- bambi scene
- download scenes from 2046
- Gossip Girl intro track
-

Understand the editing techniques in the YouTube video by Anna Maria Luisa. ->

“So You Stayed?” by Carlos Diddier.

Editing experiments ->

Daydreaming when one is commuting, metro, rickshaw, walking. When the body is in motion.Not wanting the journey to end. The fantasy to end. I always daydream when I'm in car or rickshaw and when the ride ends, there is a certain sense of disappointment. Like someone waking you up from sleep. 5 more minutes into eternity. Into loops of the same dream. v1 v2 v3.

She quoted someone writing in Nazi Germany about how they had no freedom even in their dreams. This made me think about how media controls people's attention and mediates what we dream about. I think about how mainstream media has generously contributed to my fantasies and desires since childhood. Who becomes the audience to my dreams?

Dreaming, daydreaming about love, perhaps the most important thing for all, individually and collectively. That is what I crave the most, in memories of people, the desire for love is what stands out the most. Dreams become the space to fulfil these desires in our fragmented lives in the city where one is around everyone yet not perceived.

sound notes: 
- alice notley poetry reading + dreams, fairytales and fantasies a$ap ferg
- don't zoe kravitz + surbhi's apocalyptic dream
- reading passion simple by annie ernaux + bambi soundtrack
- crows ambient
- lehrein beginning 10 seconds

shift to new pace ->

after receiving feedback, this edit feels the most resolved

Initial video edits by me:

draft with sound ->

draft cityscape ->

Persona - Ingmar Bergman

2046 - Wong Kar Wai