The Uncanny
It is something slightly odd. Not completely out of
character or place but enough to make you uncomfortable. The mind does not recognise
it as right. It spooks the mind in away that makes you look twice, makes you re-examine
to see why it’s not right. To me to be Uncanny is to be right but wrong. I can
create a sense of unease because of its strangeness.
When something is slightly out of place or does not fit with
its surroundings the mind cannot categorise it as it wants to with everything
it sees. Therefore something uncanny creates a sense of oddness. You recognise
something is not right, but it is not so massively wrong that you can not
recognise what it is, or at least should be.
I think to create something that is uncanny is to play with
the perception of ‘normality’. Maybe to open a window into a world where things
are done in a slightly different manner, or to have something move or seem
alive that usually would not. I think the question that this arises in the mind
is what creates the feeling of oddness that is The Uncanny.
