May 25, 2023

Kate Mothes

“Still Life,” a short animation by Los Angeles-based filmmaker Conner Griffith, opens with a classic game of “guess which hand.” As the illustrated hands open and close, a tiny ball morphs into a series of tools and other household objects, and we are whisked off on a journey through more than 1,000 historic engravings. Collecting images from sources like the Iconographic Encyclopedia of Science, Literature, and Art and Gray’s Anatomy—both published in the 1850s and now in the public domain—Griffith examines how items and materials help to define lifestyles, attitudes, and consciousness of the world around us. “The film explores the idea that we live in a world of objects and a world of objects lives within us,” he says.

Find more of Griffith’s work on his website and on Vimeo.

All images © Conner Griffith

#Conner Griffith#objects#short film#video

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