My initial experience with this exhibition came from its two-week installation process, which I participated in. While this doesn’t really have bearing on what the show is about or the symposium at all, it made for a very informative experience in creating a backdrop for the work that all faded to the background quite nicely. Additionally, I saw significant segments of all of these videos during their installation, a context that shifted the reception of the work from its ideal presentation. For instance, I took Jeremy Blake’s work for an elaborate holding screen for the Panasonic projector it played on. I think I should either feel embarrassed about this or sad for Jeremy Blake’s work which, (without sound) made hardly a dent in my perception.
When I look at art I find I am often interested in the Vasarian story of the artist more than in the quality of the work itself or in the efficacy of its message delivery. As an artist, I look at work in order to learn from other artists more than I look at it to be moved. What I am moved by however is often unrelated to the work specifically, but rather to the conditions which were central to the artist’s creation of that work. While Jeremy Blake’s unfortunate death and the circumstances surrounding it could be called poetic, it accounts for a false understanding of his work, risking a sympathetic read of what is otherwise unrelated to the video he created. What is more interesting and more concretely helpful in understanding what he tried to do comes from analyzing the fact of his video’s remixed construction, the three stories he therefore combined into it and the two-dimensional issues with which he was concerned. This video was chilling like a horror flick because of its sound elements. The video was effectively ghost-like, as the various characterizations of actor-images and the subsequent overlappings from disparate video segments made for a confusion of voice that felt like the disjointed rooms of the Winchester house must feel like. Blake’s smooth transitions in and out of overlapped segments and color fields felt trippy and poppy (I’ll call it trip-pop) and so very appropriate for this remix class. The fact that he felt the need to or the ability to take from his prior output and remix himself is interesting and conceited and I like it. I am left wondering what the individual video’s he brought together here would have been like. Would they deliver a message as effectively? But this isn’t something I often worry about, as I said above I’m most interested in what Blake does that can help me make my work. In this instance it is partly about combining the digital with the traditional two-dimensional realm, but more importantly about taking from one’s prior output and reinserting it into the mix. I find myself doing that more and more, as I discover what it is that keeps appearing in my work and the ways I find myself most often trying to produce those ideas.
Rick Silva’s video was the most interesting work (or maybe the most effective work) in his graduate thesis show. Having seen it then and in our class I felt less inclined to sit with it in this exhibition. I have always liked this video, but I also agree with those points of view mentioned in conversations I’ve had about this piece that found the mixing board’s presence to be unhelpful if not trite. Otherwise, the choppy sound elements and quick video cuts feel like techno beats, and the spinning Google Earth images and close-up textures under glass are mesmerizing. My favorite moments are those few times when I find technology and nature do come together in Silva’s practice, those being the flying sand grains catching the light just right, his hand arcing gracefully across the silhouetted bands of branches outlined in the sky and the supplicant moss he mixed on wet rocky terrain. I’m not sure I understand fully his need to push technology and nature together, but since he spent so much time in Colorado and he is interested in DJ culture and the digital terrain, it makes sense that he has done so.
At the symposium I heard Barbara London, Gary Emrich, Chip Lord, Luis Valdovino and Dan Boord speak. Briefly, I thought Barbara London was quite interesting, particularly regarding her mention of the preservation of video works (an important aspect of the work that I had not thought of before, and also one which benefits from extensive notes from the artist especially considering ever changing and specific technologies). Of the video works she showed, Nam June Paik in particular was great, especially in comparison with emergent digital works and the similarity in technologic experimentation that he underwent in the early days of his particular technology. In sharp contrast to Barbara London was Gary Emrich. Being totally unrelated in any way except the topic heading ‘video art’ it shouldn’t surprise to call this contrast severe. I found Emrich’s family history with television and video to be interesting though unnecessary (but still maybe my favorite part of his presentation) and his work to be, unfortunately, a bit dated (where is the stuff he is working on now?) and most egregiously, so…local. I guess this shouldn’t surprise me either, he did say he was fourth generation Coloradan. Work with local flavor can be nice, but what I sensed from his work was that it just didn’t transcend, though the documentary style of his piece about the Platte River could be an effective one.
