Jason Silva’s series Shots of awe takes mind-transforming ideas and warps them into a 3 minute YouTube format. Though Silva’s enthusiasm and optimism can be a bit over the top for some, you’ve got to admire the craft and energy that’s put into making these videos. Not only are they magnificently envisioned on the visual level, but as someone who tried his hand at producing mind-transforming videos for the web back in 2007 and 2009, I admire the great job Silva does in seemingly effortlessly translating big, complex ideas into the hyperactive format of online media. Silva is a smart guy, well versed in psychedelic thinking, and names like Terence McKenna, Timothy Leary and Robert Anton often come up in his raps. He describes his videos as “philosophical espresso shots; condensed trailers for ideas.” Indeed they work like appetizers, and hopefully they do not satisfy completely and lead viewers to deepen their exploration of the the big issues also after the video has ended. Here Silva explains why we don’t need to fear artificial intelligence And here he explains why “the idea of the singularity is awesome” If you check out his channel you’ll find Silva has created dozens and dozens of videos over the past couple of years. Recently the YouTube channel Seeker Stories did a story about Silva and his creative process titled “A philosopher’s mind trip”. An interesting viewing.
Coda
1 JulA lost soul stumbles drunken through the city. In a park, Death finds him and shows him many things.
Kylie Minogue: Sexercize rework by Hattie Stewart
30 JunThe original was not sexy enough, so Hattie had to add some improvements.
“Kaputt” by Destroyer
28 JunBeautiful and equally silly video by Dawn Carol Garcia for Destroyers “Kaputt”.
Earth – Dream Koala (2015)
27 Jun
Streak past the ISS riding Aurora Australis and re-enter the anthropocene to these excellent Sci-Fi themed space and earth visuals, with some fractal and generative art to sooth us weary travelers from the outer limits.
[Mission Report:] Space-Koalas sighted near Hibernia-Major…
Bjork “Black Lake” directed by Andrew Huang
26 Jun
Following up on last week’s post featuring another recent pairing of Andrew Huang and Bjork, here’s a recently released video from the MOMA show. Andrew is quoted as saying, “I’m very proud of ‘Black Lake’,” says Los Angeles fashion and music filmmaker Andrew Thomas Huang, who shot the video filmed in Iceland’s highlands for good reason. An article on the show appears in “Dazed” stating, “Björk wrote the song while sat in a ravine. It is our first chapter in creating the character for Björk’s epic soul journey about loss, healing and the promise of solutions.” You can read the full article here:
http://www.dazeddigital.com/music/article/25005/1/bjork-black-lake
The Intergalactic Underground and the Geula Party
26 JunSome of the DPV readers might know that I was previously involved in a few psychedelic video projects, and while it feel weird featuring my own videos on the site, I guess it’s time these video get added to the growing collection of psychedelic videos accumulating here on the DPV.
The first one of these psychedelic video projects, the Intergalactic Underground, was a messianic web course designed to turn its viewers into intergalactic masters. It went on YouTube on March 2007, at a time when there was nothing like it on the site. Michal Wexler, who was a contributor and editor on this site featured one of the videos from the series back in the early days of the DPV. Here’s another one, the first, and most memorable episode from the series.
A second psychedelic video project I produced was Geula Party, which posted its YouTube videos in parallel to the 2009 Israeli elections. The Geula party demanded consciousness expansion for Israel and for the whole middle east. It was not about running for parliament but about participating in the inner elections, the ones taking place inside consciousness. You can read more about that project in this article which was published on Reality Sandwich.
