In Sia’s music video for her song “Chandelier,” many visual elements are used to enhance the meaning of the lyrics in the song. The song is prominently about her struggles growing up in an alcoholic family and her own problems with addiction (VigilantCitizen). The music video is centralized around the idea of depression because of her harsh upbringing as a young girl. She uses colors, camera angles, lighting, and lines to symbolize the message of her tough upbringing and adult depression.

The opening scene of the music video is made very powerful with its use of color. Color is a huge factor in depicting the message of the entire song. A young girl is dressed in a nude leotard, with a blonde wig on, which is also a reoccurring theme in Sia’s music videos. She is in what seems to be an abandoned apartment, with a dirty, poor look to it. The apartment is most likely meant to represent Sia’s childhood home, where she grew up surrounded by alcoholic parents. Therefore, the young girl is most likely meant to represent Sia herself. The most prominent colors used are the green door in the opening scene, and the paintings on the walls. The rest of the apartment gives a cold feel with mostly grays and tans being used. The pops of color on the door and the walls symbolize the good times of her childhood, when she was too young to understand her parents struggles with alcoholism. There are also colorful images on the fridge in the kitchen scene. They also symbolize her longing for a better life for herself, once she became an adult and experimented with drugs and alcohol. These pictures, however, are distracted by the gray tones engulfing the entire room. The neutral colors make the viewer of the video feel sad and empty, which is how the artist felt when she was struggling with addiction. 

Another key visual element in the music video is the use of different camera shots. The opening scene of the video starts off with a full shot, with the girl standing in the doorway. Since the girl is dancing throughout the video, many different shots are used to capture her movements. The camera is constantly following her through the apartment. Long shots and full shots are mostly used, but the medium shot and close up are also used when the emotions of the dancer are meant to be shown. The switching of all of the shots while the girl is dancing is meant to show the commotion of the music video. Sia’s life as a child was always full of commotion from her parents, while she dealt with their problems as well as her own. The close up shots, which show the emotions on the dancers face, reveal the depression Sia faced as a child. In the kitchen scene, the close up shot is used on the dancers face to show her sadness. It is interesting how the cinematographers of the video used all of the different camera shots and angles to create a fluidity and movement. It shows the true nature of what the video was intended to be; a sad, chaotic depiction of Sia’s childhood. 

One of the other visual elements used to enhance the meaning of the music video is lighting. Lighting plays a large role in telling the story of Sia’s battle with depression. The opening scene (along with the majority of the video) is very gray and dark, which reveals sadness. It is especially dominant in the scene where the dancer is in the hallway. It is extremely dark and gives the viewer a cold, depressing mood. However, when the young dancer is in what appears to be the living room, natural lighting shines through a large window. It is significant that this is some of the only light that is shown in the video, because the dancer goes up to the window and starts (what seems to be) choking herself with the light, airy window curtains. This could represent the artists longing to be free from her dark, depressing life while she suffered from being surrounded by her alcoholic parents. The light could symbolize heaven, where she wants to go to escape the pain of her own life. An interesting point to add to the meaning of the music video is the fact that Sia tried to commit suicide when she was a young adult. This particular scene with the light affect, could possibly be representing that time period in her life. The lighting in this particular video plays a powerful role in telling the story of her childhood.

One final prominent visual element in the music video is the use of actual and implied lines. Most of the lines in the video are actually physical; straight, clean and simple. This enhances the simplistic look of the apartment with its cold, empty atmosphere. However, the movement of the dancer creates flowing, implied lines, which add to the chaotic aspect of the video. This relates to the choreography in the video, which is an important factor in the music video as a whole. The two different types of lines show the contrast between the simple and chaotic elements in the video and in Sia’s childhood.

Along with lines and lighting, camera shots and colors enhance the overall meaning of the music video for “Chandelier.” The contrasting lines, gray tones, close up emotional camera shots, and prominent dark lighting all contribute to showing Sia’s struggle with growing up in a family with alcoholic parents, and then leading to her own alcoholism and depression. These visual elements are important in telling a story that is both sad and powerful.  
