Friday, August 26, 2011

All About the Symbols

So I was looking around online for something interesting related to One Hundred Years of Solitude and came upon this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKelk-bEoBI

It was a project created by a student for a graphics class. Other then the technical specs, what really impressed me were the simple symbols the creator used. Although text was used, not a single word was spoken and the artist managed to represent many of the key characters through a symbol or significant event the Marquez has linked with the character. For example, Aureliano was, quite obviously, represented by gold fish but more creatively, Meme was portrayed with her lover and a flow of butterflies.

4 comments:

Mallory said...

I thought this was really cool Shaina. I feel like it would be difficult to understand if you didn't read the novel, but since we spent time going over these characters, I can easily identify what the meanings of the pictures are for each character. I liked Remedios' symbol which was obviously her "magical" ascension to Heaven. This really puts all the characters in perspective and allows you to see a glimpse into each one of their lives.

Ravin S said...

Yeah that was pretty incredible. I could easily see that being the trailer if they ever decided to make a movie out of the novel. I loved how he used a simple object to portray each character, although I do believe that he forgot to include the pig tail in Baby Aureliano III which I believed was an important element to understand the cyclical nature of the family. The score of the trailer was very somber and gloomy which I think suited the story very well, because the story was not very hopeful for mankind. The artists did a great job and I would love to see an extended trailer including characters such as Rebeca (maybe eating mud) and the 17 Aurelianos (with crosses on their heads). Also, the typography was absolutely beautiful.

mere said...

It's cool to think that a book can be visually stunning when it's just words on a page. The video made me see that their were a lot of symbols throughout each book that seemed to be connected to one particular character. Like I think rebecca might have been connected to her bag of bones etc...

ParkerC said...

The music felt very ominous along with seeing all the symbolic images. I think if someone who didn't read the book watched this video they would also feel that this story is a happy one. The title fading to dust at the end is a very nice way to end the video.