Untitled (Televisions/Found Footage)

Link to video: Untitled (Televisions/Found Footage)

The installation for which this video piece was created changed drastically since I first envisioned it 4 months ago. The video was created specifically for the installation after it had been set up. The installation consisted of 4 large televisions, wrapped in amorphous plastic bags, placed amongst a patch of trees. On each television the 20-minute video was looped continuously. Due to the fact that the installation was outside, the daylight caused some difficulty, and the visibility changed throughout the day. The piece was most effective at night, but seeing the difference on the screens between day and night was quite dramatic as well.

While not originally intended as an environmentalist piece, the materials took on a life of their own. I guess it is inevitable, though, when placing televisions, wrapped in plastic, in the bushes around trees. In the daylight, without video, it ended up looking like piles of garbage in the bushes. While frustrated with it, I decided to make the video specific to that theme.

I have an enormous collection of found-footage 8mm and 16mm film on my harddrive, and have come across many odd things over the years. For the piece I decided to stick with images of nature and humans mistreating it. As the piece was by a walkway, I wanted the message to come across quickly, yet I did not want a short, monotonous loop of the same footage. I montaged a selection of choice camping, hunting, fishing, and hiking footage, with clips of children visiting zoos, traffic, mining operations and animal abuse. The combination of these images successfully made everyone quite uncomfortable. I also produced some sound to increase the uneasiness, but unfortunately the speakers only worked on one of the four televisions. The sound is available on the clip on the Internet, but not as effective as it would be if it had been playing on the televisions.

While the video as a stand-alone piece is not quite as effective, it still has some of the intended message. The juxtapositioning of grotesque imagery, with zoos, and other abuses of nature, successfully causes the viewer to question our relationship to nature, and how we have disturbed it so greatly over the years. It was much more effective when walking across campus at night, being confronted with piles of plastic with glowing screens. While I rarely attempt to make any political art, I feel like this piece was successful, and the images appropriate to the installation in which they were played.