← Back to Main
Bigger Dreams
Single-Channel Moving Image, 2024, Individual Artwork
"Bigger Dreams" is a single-channel moving image artwork that critiques the fragility and unsustainable nature of consumeristic dreams through a series of accelerated and overlapping animations of inflating balloon letters spelling "DREAM," culminating in chaotic and distorted visual collages.
Dream occupies a special position within the contemporary consumeristic society. It is not an exaggeration to mention it as one of the most reproducible resources of capitalism. As a widely consumed commodity throughout different industries, including but not limited to Education, Beauty and Luxury, Advertising, and even the Real Estate, Dream offers modern citizens an ultimate reason to work, save, and consume. Whether it will be a Dream Job, Dream School, Dream Car, Dream Watch, Dream House, or even a Dream Partner, the sacred scarcity of Dreams is used for the undoubtable justification of an endless reproduction of the materialistic goal. Thus, the Dream is an existential form to fulfill our infinite desire, endlessly reproducible and generable to sustain consumeristic growth.
Jeff Koons’ series of inflated sculptures from the Celebration series - most notably the Balloon Dog - perfectly reflects the shiny optimism behind the Dream. Its reflective shiny flesh acts as the sculpted Dream itself formatically, which anybody might fall in love with, almost immediately, if not involuntarily [1]. The unprecedentedly inflated price of the sculpture even inflates the size of the Dream behind it. It perfectly simulates the undoubtable beauty of the materialistic culture, and thus it can be considered as one of the most successful products that the consumeristic society has ever created.
Like the reflective and inflated shape of Koons’ Balloon Dog, we are involuntarily forced to sugarcoat and inflate our Dreams. These dreams, although nominally set by ourselves, do not implicitly originate from our genuine interests or wills, but rather explicitly originate from external social forces, mostly in the form of objective materials. Thus we are nudged by society to Dream. We are nudged to desire a Dream. Once we accomplish a Dream, we are nudged to Dream for another, perhaps a Bigger Dream. This endless cycle accelerates loop after loop, both in time and scale. Failure is not an option here. There is no such thing as a scattered Dream within this scenario.
In 2023, an art fair visitor accidentally broke one of the Jeff Koons’ Balloon Dogs [2]. Dream, which seemed so eternal and unbreakable, shattered down immediately and helplessly as soon as the visitor bumped into the pedestal. It only took a few seconds for the Dream to be destroyed.
“Bigger Dreams” is a Single-Channel Moving Image Artwork highlighting and criticising the paradoxical fragiliness of the consumeristic notation of a Dream. By employing the method of acceleration and multiplicity, this artwork gradually distorts and destroys the shiny vision behind the dream. It is constructed as an iteration of over fifty loops of an identical Cinema4D-based Balloon Animation Clip. Although the original animation lasts for 45 seconds, it only takes two and a half minutes for the whole fifty iterations to be completed.
A single animation clip consists of balloon-shaped letters spelled ‘D-R-E-A-M’ inflating, placed in front of a Hollywood-like Green Screen set. Initially starting from the black voidness, green lighting flashing the whole scene gradually intensifies, highlighting the superficialness of the Dream. Once the lighting finishes, the letter balloon starts to inflate. The earlier stage of inflation seems obvious and intuitive, raising no disputation. However, as the inflation intensifies, and the balloon expands unsustainably, viewers start to dispute the validity of the Dream expanding forever, perhaps even expecting it to explode. Here, viewers confront the first degree of immersiveness - an immersiveness induced by the tension between the existing force of inflation and the fragile state of the balloon.
Contrary to their belief, the Dream does not explode, and the single animation clip ends abruptly. This sudden end is followed by five seconds of voidness, even confusing viewers. However, after this brief pause, the clip resumes in a second loop, identical to the first but played at an accelerating speed. Tension arises again, followed by the unexpected end of the clip. Then the third loop is followed, then the fourth, then the fifth, and so on, all presented at an accelerating speed. The cycle time of each loop decreases, from 45 seconds initially to a single second eventually. Within this accelerating loop, viewers confront the second degree of immersiveness - an immersiveness induced by the shortening rhythm, raising expectations towards proceeding events and the unpredictable future of the Dream.
Starting from the tenth iteration, the clips no longer appear in a temporal sequence, i.e., one after the other. Rather, new clips are overlaid on top of existing ones. At first, viewers are confronted with a strange circular structure ascending from the top of the screen, which they later identify as a vertically inverted clip overlaid. Shortly after this identification, another clip appears on top, this time upright. Then the third, then the fourth, then the fifth, and so on, presented at an accelerating speed, thus creating a chaotic collage. Within this collage, viewers confront the third degree of immersiveness - an immersiveness induced by the unexpected chaos and disorder.
This series of accelerated and multiplied collages of Dreams presents the invalidity of the traditional consumeristic notion of the materialistic Dream. It objects with the static shiny inflated portrayal of the Dream, presenting instead a dynamic, uncanny, and deflated mixture. Perhaps the true essence of the Dream, emerging not from external pressures but from an internal mindset, is found in the later chaotic scenes rather than in an earlier scene showing an inflated balloon. Perhaps our true Dreams reside in a nonlinear, chaotic realm, not as a clear linear materialistic goal, contrary to the common belief and the straightforward narratives promoted by consumerist slogans.
"Bigger Dreams" features Edward Elgar's "Pomp and Circumstance" as its background music, a piece frequently played at celebratory events like graduation ceremonies that often promote the concept of an ambitiously inflated Dream. The use of this classical tune synced with the accelerating visuals, amplifies the work’s chaotic nature and attempts to dismantle the simulacrum associated with the song's symbolic connection to the Dream.
References
Salmon, Felix. "Jeff Koons: a master innovator turning money into art." The Guardian (2014). Giuffrida, Angela. “Art fair visitor breaks $42,000 Jeff Koons balloon dog sculpture.” The Guardian (2023).
Credits
Artist: Jeanyoon Choi
Software Engineer: Jeanyoon Choi
Interaction Designer: Jeanyoon Choi
View Other Projects
Ⓒ Jeanyoon Choi, 2024