Fireside Chat: Artist's Statement

                I had a lot of rough ideas for my Fireside Chat. I was originally going to do something more serious and personal, discussing my believe in overcoming hardships and trials despite circumstance. I was going to give a speech, while audio simulating what auditory hallucinations are like. My speech would coincide with the audio - during the more intense parts my speech would also increase in intensity, etc. But, I scrapped this idea because I didn't really want to do a "Woe-is-me" approach to this. I mean, this was the last impression I could make on the class and I had the potential to create a reputation for myself. 

                So, with that in mind I took a new approach to the assignment. I started thinking about the impression I wanted to leave behind, I started thinking about what I wanted to be known for as a result of this project. Did I want to be known as the scary kid whole mentions their mental disorder at any given chance? Did I want to be known as the kid who talks about one thing and only one thing? No, not really. So I thought about things I liked: sweaters, doing nothing, sleep, being around people, ghosts, aliens, scary movies, spooks and cooks and scares. Basically, just weird, dorky paranormal garbage.

                And then it clicked, the thing I wanted to be known for. The impression I wanted to leave behind: I would be the guy who went on a tirade about ghosts. I would be the guy who made the audience play with a Ouija board so we could all be scared and all have fun together. It wasn't very serious, but I still think it was the best thing I could have done.

                Watching other people present, I found it interesting the different approaches people took. Approaches far different from what I had done, with varying interpretations of the simple prom "What I Believe In" and I think that's amazing. A simple thing can be taken in so many ways by people, and we can get presentations ranging from privilege to Lego, from make-up to dance, from Jesus to ghosts. But, I found myself applying my own approach to all of the presentations. I kept asking "Is this what this person wants to be known for? Is this the impression they want to leave behind?" But, that's not a fair question to ask, because they didn't prepare with that idea in mind.

Concerned Citizen

Video

Concerned Citizen: Taylor from Helen Butcher on Vimeo.

Artists' Statement

When it comes to media, community is very important. As community is portrayed in media, media is consumed by the community, so it’s a constant cycle of the two influencing each other. As new filmmakers, it’s our responsibility to portray and showcase communities that inspire service and kindness to the audience. Showing that the small acts we do can be a big deal to others is very important, and whether we do it for a job or just in passing, we need to remember that it doesn’t take much to make other people happy.

Taylor Whitehead is a daughter, friend, college student, and CNA. CNA means Certified Nurse’s Assistant, a job where she goes to people’s houses and help take care of their elders. Cody suggested that Taylor be the subject of our project because she pointed out that it takes a special kind of person to dedicate their life to helping old people. We wanted to portray Taylor as an ordinary young woman, so we tried to be fairly casual about the shoot. This was to emphasize that it doesn't take an extraordinary person to do good things. The emotion and interest comes from solely Taylor herself as she is so animated and happy to talk about her job. This is what sets her apart; she’s dedicated to doing this job not because it’s hard, but because it makes her happy and others happy. The work she describes seems simple, but it’s clear that she is a huge help to the old people.

This week in class we read Human Rights and Culture: From Datasan to Storyland by Arlene Goldbard. A quote we liked from that was “In Storyland, we understand that the resilience that sustains communities in times of crisis is rooted in culture, in the stories of survival and social imagination that inspire pepe to a sense of hope and possibly even in dark times. Sharing our stories as song, drama, dance, in word or image supports resilience by showing people how theirs met similar challenges, survived and prospered.” This supports our idea that it doesn’t take much to help others, and when we show this in the media, we can inspire communities to come together with those small acts. An example of this in the media is Soul Surfer (McNamara), a movie based on a true story about a thirteen year old girl who gets her arm bitten off by a shark. It’s an inspiring to see the community rally around her and give her love and support through the small collective acts of them all. Therefore, when everyone does small and simple acts of service and kindness, the result can be overwhelmingly positive.

In conclusion, it’s important to show service in the media to inspire communities to do good things. Like Taylor, we can choose to do things that make us happy while also helping out others. When we show this in media, it can inspire communities because it shows that when everyone bands together to do good things, amazing and inspiring things can happen.

World Building

In our world, gravity isn’t a constant. Instead, it just sort of wildly fluctuates throughout the day. This idea was somewhat inspired by the Kurt Vonnegut novel Slapstick. In it, sudden, rapid shifts in gravity’s force cause the whole of society to plummet into chaos. When we were pitching ideas, Slapstick immediately came to my mind because of how drastically this one thing changed the world. I thought that this idea could be interpreted in a lot of different, really interesting ways. Our world is a lot less intense than the one described in Slapstick, the whole of society hasn’t collapsed. Instead, people have had to make adjustments to live their day to day lives despite the random shifts in gravity.

We created concept drawings of different ways typical items would be altered in order to function in this world. For example, towns would have domes over them to stop things (including people, and even the air itself) from floating away into space when gravity fluctuates into its weakest levels, or anchored chairs with buckles that allow people to strap themselves in and wait for gravity to return to normal. Another idea we had is a vest that has a controllable mass, that can be increased or decreased depending on the strength of gravity allowing people to still walk around during the fluctuations. All of these ideas would have varying levels of quality, richer people would be able to afford better equipment while the poorer would have to settle for things like strapped down chairs. This would create a very clear distinction between the upper and lower class.

One example from the class that we drew inspiration from was the notice from the film, District-9. This public notice gave us the idea to create our own for our world where gravity is not constant. So we wanted to create a sign that portrays a particular public issue that commonly occurs in our world. We wanted to show how littering is a very eco shattering problem, more than it is in our present world. When people choose to litter in our world, it can be lost into our atmosphere every time our gravity starts to fluctuate. In this world, you are unable to simply pick up litter from the ground, because it floats around the atmosphere, getting in the way and polluting the air. Another issue that this fluctuation in gravity creates is sudden, forceful garbage rain caused by higher levels in gravity makes trash jettison towards the Earth with extreme force.

It was interesting to think of all the implications that such a world demands, from the obvious (the need for mass-changing vests and chairs with “seat belts”) to the more unapparent (like the need for domes so that the atmosphere doesn’t float away, or the litter problem). We tried to imagine what the everyday life of someone living here would be like, and it helped us to come up with more creative ideas. Though we all agreed that living in this world would not be fun, the citizens of it have made it manageable for themselves, and that is what we tried to convey with this assignment.

Textual Poaching: Fear in False Advertising

Fear in False Advertising

Artist's Statement

I am a 20 year old, LDS, American male who attends BYU. There are a lot of different things that I, according to society, should be doing at this point in my life. Men my age are supposed to be enlisting in the military, to prove their dedication to their country and to their masculinity. Men my age are supposed to be getting married, so they can have a wife to take care of. Men my age are supposed to be having kids, the ultimate sign of your life being on track. And if you are a man my age, at least at BYU,  and you aren't doing these things they you should be on a mission, to prove your dedication to God and Church and to make everyone proud that you are doing what you should be doing.

Except, I'm not doing any of those things. I am 20 years old and I'm not in the military, I'm not married or even engaged, I'm obviously not having children anytime soon, and I have not and likely will not go on a mission. I am an anomaly, at least according to the ideal. Honestly, all of these things that I am supposed to be doing, that I am so clearly failing at doing, terrify me to no end. I can barely take care of myself, let alone a spouse and kids. And so, I've taken old advertisements of what men are typically supposed to do, and combined them with still from old horror movies. Army recruitment propaganda mixed with Michael Myers, the Preach My Gospel cover mixed with Leatherface, an ad for fatherhood mixed with Linda Blair, a man and a woman passionately kissing on the streets of New York mixed with Freddy Krueger. Mixing the typical with the horrific, to show that I am both missing these seemingly important milestones, and actually, to some extent, scared of these things to varying degrees.

This is similar to Eileen Maxson's Cinderella+++, which mixed classic Disney scenes with audio from more modern films. She gave a new meaning, a darker meaning, to these innocent classics to show just how different reality is from the expected. Following along with the idea of an incongruity between societal and medial depictions of what it means to be a man, and what I experience as a man, recent studies have shown that men are incredibly effected by the sexist way they are portrayed in advertisements. The Huffington Post wrote an article entitled"Be A Man" which discusses how advertisements, both modern and not, are promoting a hyper-masculinity that is causing men to feel generally discouraged with their own self image, and this in turn is leading to low self-esteem, poor body image and, in extreme cases, things like drug use and violence towards women.

Webspinna Artist Statement

I was really excited for the Webspinna battle, because I love any project that involves me getting attention. But, I was a little worried when it was announced that it was moving up a week. And then I didn't get a partner on the Thursday before it was due, which was very worrisome. Really, I only had two days to work with my partner on out presentation - which is very stressful. But, in the end I really like how it turned out. Taylor and I decided to do Halloween vs. Christmas, which is awesome for me (ignoring the fact that another group had the same idea).

We decided to have Christmas sort of encroaching onto Halloween's territory, and Halloween not being happy about that. It was sort of a reflection on how, during the holiday season, decorations for the next holiday go up before the current one has even happened. At the beginning of October, Christmas decorations had already been put on display in stores, despite it being three months, and two holidays, away. One of the sounds I used was for an Onion video about how Halloween has become over-commercialized, poking fun at how people have lost the true meaning of Halloween and are taking the shortcuts to make their experience easier.

It was interesting only being able to use sounds that already exist, and not being able to edit together anything or record anything. From other people's work, we had to create our personas and out entire presentation. We needed to raid things that had already existed and break them up and reform them into another, separate work. In this week's reading "The Ecstasy of Influence: a Plagiarism" by Jonathan Lethem, there is a nice quote about this idea about literature being broken up in this way to great new works: "Literature has been in a plundered, fragmentary state for a long time." This project is more obvious in its breaking up of previous pieces to build up a new, greater piece. But, this sort of thing has been happening since the beginning if literature, people borrow from previous things in order to augment their creations more.

One thing I thought was fun about this project was how it was live, which meant things could (and did) and we needed to improvise and create. We had an issue with our Webspinna that required me to improvise a lot. The last few clips didn't work, which meant our presentation lacked an ending. Instead of floundering in front of everyone, I simply yelled out what our ending was, and then threw the prop glow-sticks to show that something happened. 

Webspinna Battle Playlist

• Spooky Scary Skeleton- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTgFtxHhCQ0
• Nightmare Before Christmas ST- https://play.spotify.com/album/32hXKuDkMnpQaOI67xQj86
• “What’s This”- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVSpfQHEsNY
• Anaconda Laugh-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jy-QbberpXM
• Halloween Overcommercialized- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0McggLIYmnE
• This Is Halloween- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVSpfQHEsNY
• Halloween sound FX soundboard- http://www.soundboard.com/sb/halloween
• Psycho Theme- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me-VhC9ieh0
• The Nightman Cometh- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OR4zefzP7d0#t=308

Medium Specificity: Filming a Photograph

The Video

Artist's Statement

      For this week's topic, I was worried that I would not be able to produce anything that actually captured the idea of medium specificity, and that I would end up just creating a few Pollock knockoffs and resign to unoriginality. However, once I started thinking past the well known and into newer mediums, and idea formed in my head and I realized that I had found my project: Photographs. Specifically, amateur photos people take of their friends and family in order to remember that specific event.

     Vacation photos, graduation photos, birthday photos etc. all share a common aesthetic: people standing, posing in what they believe to be the most natural way. Except, it isn't really a natural pose at all. It is an idealized pose that the subject uses because that is how they want to be remembered when they look back at these photos. Although people want to have nice, candid photos of themselves, they usually end up with idealized forms of themselves, slipping their way down uncanny valley.

     So, I wanted to explore this idea, this space that last all but a fraction of a second when someone takes a picture. Only, I wanted to expand that small moment into uncomfortably long moments. I asked subjects to act as if I was their brother, father, uncle, friend taking a photo of them at a significant moment in their life. And then, I pressed record. They assumed I was taking a picture, so they waited until I said I was done. After a while, they typically started to change their pose slightly, to make it more comfortable. Eventually, they caught on and told me to stop recording. At that point, they realized just how silly they had actually looked.

     I do have to admit that the idea of filming people when they think you are simply taking a picture is not originally mine, I first saw the concept about a year ago on Youtube. A man named Dean Fleischer-Camp took five second long videos of his friends in a short he titled Smile (Warning, some language). Drawing from this inspiration, I decided to extend this thing that is only supposed to be a second of a second, into a clip long enough to show how silly posing really is.

     The people who helped me waited to be captured, without realizing that they were already being captured. Without realizing it, the people on camera were a part of the creation. This is a similar idea that John Cage had in his song 4'33", which is a piece of music which has no notes. It is performed by having a man or woman sit at a piano and time themselves, occasionally shifting for each movement but never playing a single note. This causes the audience to become a part of the piece, every sound they make becomes the music of 4'33", and without knowing it, by just is existing a space, they have embodied the meaning of the piece of art.

Historical Script: Ted and Genghis' s Fetal Adventure

Ted and Genghis's Fetal Adventure Script

      

Artist's Statement

Our script, Ted and Genghis’s Fetal Adventure, tells the story of Genghis Khan and his twin fetus Ted. This script is based on the Mongolian legend that Genghis ate his twin fetus in the womb, which was considered a sign of his greatness to come. Obviously, there is no evidence to support this historical tale, but the rumor exists and served as a great platform to write our script. All of the details, which are few, come from word of mouth over generations. One of the inspirations for this script is Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. In this film, famous historical figures are taken out of their original histories and transplanted into a reimagined 80s context. These characters are exaggerated and their traits and personalities are fabricated to fit into this new 80s-themed world.

          We did essentially the same thing in our script. We adjusted the environment of the womb to our own liking, and then exaggerated the traits that we assume Mongolian fetuses would have. It is absurd and almost completely unrealistic. However, this imagination of the story generates a few interesting ideas as to what caused Genghis Kahn to eat his twin. It also explores what kind of effect this act had on Genghis, and how this act directly influenced Genghis's personality and his effect on mankind. Another source of media that had an effect on this project is the film The Bad Seed. This film deals heavily with the idea of nature versus nurture. It makes us question if some people are just bad seeds, or if everyone is good and then simply becomes bad. Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis tells the story of a girl who, because of her upbringing, decides that she wants to become a prophet. She wants to create a way of living that will help people the most, it can be argued that she is a very good person. But, she comes to this decision because her country is put under a new, pro-Islamic rule. Satrapi, after being forced to wear a veil at school, sees the ways that religions are failing and this is the spark that causes her to want to create a new, more helpful code of life.

          While our script was not meant to send a message either way, due to circumstance it clearly sides with the idea of nature and that there are bad seeds. It is an interesting argument that currently has no real answer, so it was interesting to, albeit unintentionally, throw our two cents in. Our script argues both sides, really. In it, Ted is a bad seed, he was conceived bad and is bad throughout. But, he pushes Genghis to his limit and causes Genghis to snap, which leads to him become the ruthless warmonger he was. Some people are born bad, some are made bad.

Writing a Paper

Here's the audio of the Process Piece.

Before starting our assignment, Benjamin discussed how the processes within our lives help define our identity and sometimes, even our humanity. As full-time students with jobs, our “processes” tend to lean away from the more fun moments life has to offer. If our identity were truly defined solely on the processes we engaged in, we'd probably relate more to shampoo instructions with a wash-rinse-repeat lifecycle than an actual person with fun activities or interesting lives. Our daily schedule is typically: wake up, go to classes, write a papers, do readings, and then work - hopefully fitting eating and sleeping in there somewhere.

Taking this into consideration, we decided to present a typical college student activity: writing a paper. However, we added a small twist to the project. Different people approach the same process is many different ways, as we see in the Routines series from this week's viewings. The videos all show fairly typical events that are apart of someone's daily routine, such as putting on a belt, shaving, flipping on a light, stamping an envelope. But, the way this one person does these things isn't the exact way someone else does it, although the action is the same throughout, the approach varies person to person. Even though all students have to write papers, individual students each have their own method for writing. This is why you will find a different recording on each blog. Both contain the process of writing a paper, the same exact way, except one student strays from focus and takes a small detour to watch some videos on Youtube. But in the end, both students accomplish the same task.

There were many directions we could have taken this project, however, we wanted to focus on the process alone, and how this process is typically done by oneself, so we decided to not use any dialogue in our recording. This is a method used in videos often, and example is the Google Chrome Speed Tests commercial. There is no dialogue (save for a song at the end) and so you are only focusing on the process that is happening before you. No one is telling what to look at or hear, so it is up to you to look and listen for what you see. So, we show that writing a paper is a very solitary and monotonous experience, hence the lack of voice, but we also show that in the monotony there is variation from person to person, in our two process pieces different steps lead to the same outcome.

Round Robin Artists' Statement

In his essay entitled “Totems without Taboos: The Exquisite Corpse,” DJ Spooky asserts that “the remix, as always, is what you make of it. Juxtapose, fragment, flip the script — anything else, simply put, would be boring.” During our Round Robin exercise, it seemed as if everybody was “flipping the script” as each group member continued the previous person’s story, this led to some drastic tonal shifts within the narratives. On the flip side of that, there are some stories where a thread is woven finely throughout all five of the mini-stories, making a (more or less) complete narrative, with each story complementing the last.

  This technique of starting a story and then passing it on to another to complete is nothing new; there is a game called “Photoshop Tennis” during which one person introduces a photograph and then sends it off to another person to add a visual element to it, who then passes it on to another person to edit. This goes on indefinitely, unless a specified  number of edits has been pre-agreed upon. An example of this is:

  “The “text” is never inanimate — it’s the human imagination that gives shape and meaning, the elixir that breathes life into the golem.” In some ways, pieces of art that we create and “finish” are never really done. Unbeknownst to us, somebody could pick up that piece of work that we created and add to it until it is unrecognizable from the work that we created initially.

  Another art form that can be remixed is music. Famous artists create and release music that then gets into the hands of the remixers, who then make the music their own by adding and removing musical elements. By doing so, they restructure the song in a way that was never meant by its original author.

  In our Round Robin storytelling experience, each of the tiny stories stand alone. However, combining five of the stories together creates a collage of different ideas that all spring from the same seed. Each contributor used a different vocabulary to try to make sense of the unusual and limited information they were given. In a way, one artist’s choice to use “the hardiest of folk” to describe a group of people that a previous artist described as “notoriously rowdy bunch” differed in verbal texture as much as water colors and oil paints do. Thus, even if all of us tried to preserve the tone and content of the story, it would inevitably change over time.

  Our individual pictures added an extra element of expression and another opportunity to leave our mark on the story. We had varying styles and a wide variety of framing to suggest plot. As mentioned earlier “The remix, as always, is what you make of it. Juxtapose, fragment, flip the script”. On occasion, an author would create a juxtaposition, fragmentation, or script-flip between the picture and the text, thus creating an odd precedence in the mind of the next author. Close-ups versus wide shots, color versus monochrome, and other such aesthetic decisions all added something different to the mix.

Round Robin

Michael looked for the door, but couldn't find it. He felt around frantically until he found a knob. He tried to turn it, and . . . locked.

Frustrated, Michael felt around for the light switch. He flipped it, and suddenly the ground fell out from underneath him! Down he fell into a pool of sharks.

The sharks thrashed Michael with their nuzzling noses.

These were not the cuddle buddies Michael yearned for.

But he could call them home, and that was good enough for him.

Music Mosaic Artists Statement

                In Annie Dillard's "Seeing" she says that "Everywhere darkness and the presence of the unseen appalls." She talks about how we are strangers to the darkness, and how shadows spread and deepen and that, even after thousands of years, we are still "strangers to darkness." This is an idea that I wanted to convey in my Music Mosaic. I wanted to explore the unknown, the fearful, the dark matters of the world. I picked Bjork's discordant song Dark Matter as the platform to build my mosaic. I drew inspiration for my photographs from my first year at BYU, when I was diagnosed with schizophrenia and almost failed out. I would often find myself wondering around Provo at 2 in the morning - scared, alone and confused.

                I wanted to simulate what those late night walks were like in the best most understandable way possible. However, it's hard to make the overwhelming feeling of confusion and paranoia understandable. It's hard to use the concrete to describe the abstract. So, I chose a song those sounds like it shouldn't work, and yet somehow does. Bjork uses a made up jabber of lyrics to punctuate the moody music in her song. She set out to write a song to explain the unexplainable, it sounds as if it shouldn't work and yet it somehow does work together to create, in my opinion, one of the best representations of pure fear and confusion.

                Mixing these ideas together, I went out after work one night in an attempt to capture this idea that, by definition, couldn't be captured. I wanted to find the most concrete way I could show the darkness of Dark Matter, and to capture the "presence of the unseen," and to just represent how I felt my first year here in order to express myself better. The first image opens with the side of a building at night, there's a high contrast because of the flash of the camera, like the first note of Dark Matter, this image sets the tone of the rest of the mosaic, without giving away what the rest will be like.

                The remaining images show a combination of walls, parking lots, benches and the night sky. I used techniques commonly attributed to William Hope, a hoax photographer who convinced people he had actual photographs of ghosts.^[1]  Shadowy figures stand menacingly in the frame, smoke from sticks of incense mixed with the camera's flash create ghostly masses, the use of double exposure creates transparent figures just out of sight.

                I wanted to create a sense of unease and paranoia with my photographs, because I wanted to expose everyone to the feelings that I, and likely many others, get while walking around alone at night. Seeing out of the corner of your eye what might be a person, but is likely just your own shadow or a trick of your mind. But the idea is already there, that there might be someone just outside of your field of vision waiting for you to turn away.

Click Here to see Mosaic

^[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Hope_(paranormal_investigator)

Music Mosaic: Shadows in the Night

Link to the song: Bjork - Dark Matter

Click here to read Artist's Statement.

Why Do People Seek Out the Unknown?

                Human beings are naturally imaginative creatures and, because of this, we tend to reject the most logical reasons for things to happen, and instead search for and invent the most fantastic version of events we can. As people, we are naturally drawn towards the unknown, the mysterious, the conspiracy because we tend to be unsatisfied with the simplest, most logical truth. People are often bored with their lives and situations, and with that boredom and dissatisfaction they will invent a way to make it all seem more interesting and make everything seem more significant. We invent stories, find new ways to spin our experiences, in an attempt to make sense of the monotony and bring meaning to experiences. However, most things people experience on a daily basis are just mundane events that hold no significance. In relation to every other person, one individual's life is no more or less important than any other individuals. We are all the same. However, no one wants to have a boring life of mediocrity; everyone has an innate need to be important.

                The idea of seeking the fantastic in the everyday is what gives people the desire to create art in any form. In film, the horror genre tries to take the most relatable of human experiences and turn them into the most exciting, and the most horrifying, version it can. The Conjuring is an American horror film directed by James Wan, released in 2013. Taking place in 1971 in Harrisville, Rhode Island the film tells the story of the Roger and Carolyn Perron who, along with their five daughters, move in to a new home. However, malevolent things start to happen and, in desperation, mother Carolyn seeks out the help of renowned paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren. The Warren's very profession shows that they strive to invent the most fantastic version of events that they can. They travel far and wide helping people with paranormal problems, and collecting supposedly haunted items along the way. In their home, they have a room full of proof that their lives aren't boring, and that they are constantly battling against terrible and powerful forces. They essentially collect mysteries, and then put them on display for others to see.

We see the Warrens during one of their investigations.

                In the film, Ed Warren suggests that he and his wife take a break from their seemingly dangerous lives and settle on tamer pursuits. Ed suggests to Lorraine that she write the book she'd always been planning, a rewarding yet slightly dull task. Lorraine dismisses her husband's idea and says that "God brought us together for a reason, and I'm pretty sure it's not to write a book." . This idea, that every person is meant to do something great, is the driving force behind creativity. People want to make their mark in life, they want to feel important. We read books, watch TV shows and movies, and share stories with others  because we are dissatisfied with reality, so we need to invent a new, more exciting reality.  Everyone sees themselves as the protagonist in life, and they don't want the story of their life to be disappointing so they continually jump to the fantastic as a way of explaining things. Lorraine refuses to settle down and write a book, because she believes that she and her husband have a higher calling in life.

"God brought us together for a reason, and I'm pretty sure it's not to write a book."

                Carolyn seeks out the Warrens because she knows that there must be some outside force acting on her and her family, because if there isn't an outside force then all Carolyn has is a scared family and an old house. Accepting Carolyn's offer, the Warrens go to the Perron's home to see how bad the situation Carolyn described truly is. While there, Ed notices that one of the doors inside the house is tied shut with a small rope. When he asks Roger about it, we learn that every night the door would bang and, after getting fed up, the family decided it best to tie the handles. Logically speaking, a door banging in an old house is a very common occurrence, however Ed is dissatisfied with the logical reason and instead informs the Perrons that a knocking noise at night, especially when in groups of three, is typical of demonic infestation. Specifically, the three knocks serve as a mockery to the Holy Trinity. This way of thinking is incredibly typical for people. Instead of using the most logical, realistic approach, every immediately jumps to a fantastic idea. It isn't just a simple draft in the Perron's home, it's demons mocking God.

                People have a need inside of them to make the mundane seem extraordinary, so they try to spin their experiences in a way that makes it all seem so fantastic. People religiously seek out the unknown by reading anything from conspiracy theories to ghost stories to fantasy novels and etc. By watching horror, science-fiction films, or mystery films people are exposing themselves to the unknown and letting their own mind fill in the gaps. This is evident in the Conjuring when we see daughter Christine pointing behind the bedroom doing claiming there is someone watching them. 

It's more enjoyable to imagine the
"monster" than it is to actually witness it.

As an audience, we never see the figure behind the door and so all of the horror happens inside our mind. The only limit to the horror is our own imagination. It's more fun, in both the horror genre and in life, to speculate about what could be out there than it is to actually know what is out there. To most people, the mystery is better than the reality. The hunt for the truth in a fantastically constructed reality is more satisfying than knowing the truth in a dull reality.