Artificial Perspectives
Super8 film loop, custom rear-projection screen, hand-made electronics, video projection, scale-model movie theater, miniature movie patrons, found theater seats, wide-angle peepholes, photographs.
2006.
The Artificial Perspectives exhibition ran from July 15 through August 19, 2006 at Teti gallery. The work was conceived of and created collaboratively with George Monteleone. The exhibition featured two installations, one built around a video piece and the other a film piece. The work in the show was based around ideas of manipulated, forced and artificial perspectives.
The Technocrats
Lambda print
24" x 24"
2006
This image is of a piece in the show which is a reenactment of a painting called "The Ambassadors," done in
1533 by Hans Holbein. The painting features a conspicuous grey smudge
across a portrait of two learned renaissance gentlemen. The smudge,
when viewed from a particular angle, reveals itself to be a distorted,
anamorphosed skull. "The Ambassadors" has been the subject of extensive metaphorical analysis by art historians; you can read some interpretation of Holbein's painting here. George and I re-enacted the painting as a tableau vivant in our
installation The Technocrats.
The piece was designed to be approached from outside of the gallery. An external door contained a large glass peephole. By looking through this peephole, a viewer is
able to see a film loop featuring the re-enactment of the painting.
A rear-projection screen was hung on the opposite side of the door. The screen was positioned close enough to the door so that the film image filled the
entire 160-degree viewing angle offered by the peephole. Additionally, a pair of speakers were mounted on the inside of the door. If a viewer put an ear to the door
from the outside, a sound composition was audible. The peephole and the speakers together suggested the idea that a scene was taking place in the room, which could be
viewed and heard from outside of the room.
The sound composition was created by George. The starting element of the sound piece was a series of MIDI recreations of renaissance court music George found online. He was able to locate pieces of music composed in the same time period as the Holbein painting. The completed sound mix featured a number of these MIDI songs mixed with different types of modem and computer
sounds. Our initial inspiration was the tinny monophonic versions
of classical pieces that serve as cell phone ring tones. We felt that this collision of antiquated high culture and contemporary technology on the cusp of obsolescence
was an appropriate audio analog to our recreation of the famous painting.
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The Surveyors
These images are documentation of the second installation in the Artificial Perspectives show. The piece was centered around the perspectival alignment of a keystoned rectangle. In a performance documented in photographs and video, George and I staked a keystoned rectangle in a field with rope. The camera's viewpoint resolves the distended shape into a square. We then distorted the video projection itself into a similar keystoned rectangular shape, and projected it onto the gallery wall. By viewing the projection through a peephole set into a miniature theater, the viewer participates in the "correct" perspective needed to resolve the keystoned shape, and is able to see the video clearly.
