Description

Spielberg’s Hollywood (Large) by Mark Davies

You know I’m partial to the occasional piece of movie art! I know this falls within my ‘Retrospective’ body of work but I always look to include a movie scene as this collection tends to fall just ahead of the festive season and there aren’t many better times to watch a blockbuster than at Christmas.

My movie art is typically within my ‘Lost in Hollywood’ series and if you look at this piece and what is going on, then you well and truly are just that, or possibly legged it in Hollywood! I have wanted to do a full-on movie ‘mash up’ for a good while now as I have always enjoyed the prospect of different movies all playing out at the same time and seeing the chaos that ensues. Building on this, I also knew that there was cracking potential to showcase a specific film director each time as each attracts a die-hard following. So here we are in 2022 and the premier of ‘Spielberg’s Hollywood’.

So, initially the plan was to set this within the cinema itself, which would have been great and still can be but given the type of films that Spielberg has mastered and that I have loved depicting in past works, I felt that I needed more space for the mayhem to unfurl and I do love a gritty street scene. A retro styled movie theatre is the backdrop to an alleyway that is literally littered with detail and references to some of his most incredible movies, some more blatant than others! I won’t list them all for you as I prefer you to be left to seek them out. I’ll give you a clue though, there’s a couple of dinosaurs in there hiding!

I’ve said before how I don’t plan out every single detail before I start as I prefer to see how the piece evolves, twists and turns whilst I fall deeper into the mindset of what I am creating, and this is personified with this image and is so much stronger and intriguing from it. In an age where nothing stands still and you can’t keep up with the new ways that they are bringing the movie closer to the audience, it’s crazy and exciting, brutal actually. I say that from past experience of watching a Jurassic Park movie in 4DX, I left feeling battered and bruised and a bit giddy, to think I almost brought my Mum along with me too!

I wanted to go even further in this piece, and this is how it evolved so nicely. A solitary movie chair takes center stage, with the sole audience, you, clearly missing! At what point did you decide to leg it? The T-rex? The three-legged alien? (I’m sure I had a friend with that nickname!) Surely not E.T? The aim was to create a truly immersive cinematic experience that makes 4DX and IMAX look like a Punch and Judy show! Oh, and a little insight into my thinking, the position of the chair with the T-Rex bearing down on it, or you was a nod to the toilet scene in Jurassic Park.

I loved working on ‘Speilberg’s Hollywood’, it has turned out so well and hit another level to how I first envisaged. I hope you love it, it’s a blockbuster that’s offered in small numbers, after all, greed breeds monsters