Artist Review: Kylen Tombs

Kylen has a very surreal aesthetic that is immediately apparent upon viewing her concept art and leica reel for her film. She is comfortable working in this style, as any look inside of her sketchbook could tell you. The beginning of her film sets up an introduction to herself. This aesthetic opens you up to how she likes to view things. Objects transform fluidly, move smoothly and are colored brightly. Her animation style sets up the tone for the rest of the film.

The animation style is completely fluid. Characters move like breezes, like water, flowing from one pose to the next. It reminded me a lot of Ryan Woodward's "Thought of You" (http://vimeo.com/14803194). In fact, Kylen and I had talked about this together, and she told me how eerily close this was to what she envisioned in her head. I think, knowing this, I understood her film's style and conception much better.

I remember talking to Kylen about her main character. She wanted to depict a male with a masculine grace. A balance of delicate beauty, while still retaining all of his masculinity. I think this stems from Kylen growing up in an area where she describes all the men as aggressive meatheads. There is no subtlety or grace in how they act and how they live. I imagine that Kylen idealizes a male that doesn't have to give up his masculinity in order to be beautiful.

In terms of the characters, we have Clarence, Panama and Cordy. When I read about them I immediately thought about the id, ego and super-ego. I was sure that this trio was represented by them.

The id is the part of the psyche that simply desires pleasure and avoiding anything unpleasant. It is the primal nature of us all. Some view it as chaos, but considering that all babies are born functioning purely thought the id, I think there's some sort of purity in it. It isn't good or evil. It simply wants to exist. This seems to fit her character Cordy, a naive young 18 year old acting on her primal natures and simply desiring to be a free spirit.

The super-ego strives for greatness. It prohibits fantasies and masturbatory acts. The super-ego will act in socially appropriate manner, unlike the primal way the id acts, simply seeking out instant gratification. Clarence's girlfriend, Panama, is the super-ego. She is a pop star, striving for greatness, but doing it in the limelight and through the approval of society.

And then there is the ego. The ego is the realist. Common sense. Attempted balance. The balance between the id and the super-ego. The ego is in between the two, attempting to create peace. The ego attempts to try to help control the id, helping it quell its chaotic nature. The super-ego on the other hand, will constantly watch what the ego does and upon failing or making a mistake, the super-ego will put the ego on a guilt trip. Because of this, the ego has a slight favor to the id in that the ego can look over problems the id has since the id doesn't mean any harm. The nagging, guilt and feelings of inferiority from the super-ego wear down the ego, but the ego learns to cope.

Having the characters reflected like so in my head, I can already see where the story would be headed.

I think Kylen is working through this greatly. While I'm not sure that her 3 characters were meant to be representations of the 3 parts of the psyche, it is actually working well in that way and was the first thing that popped into my head. I should tell her about all of this!

(Kylen's Production Blog: http://kylendraws.webs.com/apps/blog/)