Cyriak

Cyriak at Flash on the Breach, North Laine, Brighton, 2010

Cyriak Harris is an English freelance animator better known by his first name Cyriak, and his B3ta username Mutated Monty. He is known for his surreal and often disturbing short web animations.[1]

Animation

A regular contributor to the British website B3ta since 2004,[2] Cyriak displays a surreal, psychedelic animation style, based on fractal geometry and orders of magnitude, often with a distinct British theme. Many of his animations are based on A-List celebrities, television shows and his hometown of Brighton. Cyriak's work has recurringly featured cats, cows, and sheep, among other themes. He has noted on his personal YouTube page that he uses a combination of Adobe Photoshop and After Effects for his animation and visuals along with Image-line's FL Studio for the original electronic music compositions that accompany many of the videos.

Cyriak's YouTube account features a compilation of his animations, which have been popular throughout the blogosphere and noted by Wired's Eliot Van Buskirk.[3] Cyriak's animation "MOO" has featured on the front page of Wired. His 2009 video "poo pants" features an animated sample of broadcaster Alan Titchmarsh singing a repeated refrain from the bowls of a series of toilets, some of which fly through space.[nb 1]

As a freelance animator he has been commissioned by Coke for a Coke Zero advert,[4] the video sharing website Sumo TV, and a music video for Grand Popo Football Club, among others.

On 1 January 2011 several of Cyriak's YouTube videos were used in a special New Year's event on the US cable television network Adult Swim. Cyriak has also made several bumps for Adult Swim and Cartoon Network.[5] In 2012, he directed the music video for Flying Lotus's "Putty Boy Strut".

In 2013 he directed music videos for Bonobo's "Cirrus" and Bloc Party's "Ratchet".[6]

On 14 August 2014 he released a video entitled "malfunction", of which Cyriak himself said: "I've no idea what this video is. It crawled out from some dark corner of my computer after evolving from the virtual maggots that feast on rotting film footage."[7]

Awards and recognition

On 3 December 2009 Cyriak was announced as the winner of the 2009 E4 E Stings competition.[8]

His work also resulted in a short BBC South East news interview in November 2006.[9] The video "DeadEnders" was commissioned by the BBC as a sequel to Cyriak's earlier "BeastEnders". Based on the British soap opera EastEnders, it explored the idea of all the Eastenders characters who had died over the years rising from the grave and embarking on a "brain-eating zombie rampage". Both films were featured on the BBC Three comedy series Comedy Shuffle.[4]

In 2006 he also received a special mention in the results of a Photoshop competition run by the technology series Click.[10] In November 2011 he won Best Budget Dance Video[11][12] at the UK Music Video Awards as director for "We Got More" by Eskmo.

Lottery prediction

On 9 September 2009, British illusionist Derren Brown, live on UK television, claimed to predict the National Lottery numbers. Cyriak uploaded a possible explanation, to his YouTube channel, which gained half a million views within a week and attention from national press.[13]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Bradshaw, Peter (31 March 2010). "The surreal YouTube genius of Cyriak". The Guardian. Retrieved 20 July 2010. growing cult following for his brilliant bursts of surrealism and drollery ... notably winning awards for his sting designs for E4, and for TV ads ... miniaturist genius
  2. ↑ "B3ta member profile". B3ta.com. Retrieved 2007-12-09.
  3. ↑ Van Buskirk, Eliot (2006-10-20). "Friday Fun: Cyriak's Animation Mix". Wired.com. Retrieved 2007-12-09.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Cyriak Harris. "Cyriak's website". Cyriak Harris. Retrieved 2007-12-09.
  5. ↑ "Adult Swim bumps" at cyriak.co.uk
  6. ↑ "Music video for Bloc Party’s Ratchet: More crazy work from Cyriak » Lost At E Minor: For creative people". Lost At E Minor. 2 July 2013. Retrieved 16 August 2014.
  7. ↑ cyriak's channel (15 August 2014). "malfunction". YouTube. Retrieved 16 August 2014.
  8. ↑ E4 Finalists
  9. ↑ "BBC news interview on YouTube". Retrieved 2007-12-09.
  10. ↑ "Click Online competition results". BBC News. 2006-05-12. Retrieved 2007-12-09.
  11. ↑ "Cyriak's blog". Retrieved 16 November 2011.
  12. ↑ "UK MVA winners". Retrieved 16 November 2011.
  13. ↑ Connolly, Lucy (2009-09-16). "How Derren Brown fooled you in Lotto 'prediction'.". The Sun. Retrieved 2009-09-16.

Footnotes

Notes
  1. ↑ The video is framed with a strong editorial explanation: "this film is at its heart an exploration of both personal and cultural themes, exposing our exploitative relationship with our environment on a personal level and, by extension, as a society or species. The poo in this sense is a symbol of the by-products of our capitalist consumerism, with alan titchmarsh reflecting the role of the media; alerting us, ridiculing us, perhaps even judging us - the media becomes a collective conscience that binds us to our own environmental mortality. The refrain of titchmarsh is answered by our inability as a global society to take a truly global responsibility; as we continue to poo at paul's we are nevertheless reminded that the poo is in fact very much situated in our own pants."

External links