Core Samples (for Smack Mellon Gallery, Brooklyn, NY)

Core Samples, 2000, C-print mounted to wood, melamine edging, h 16’ x w .5", destroyed, bottom image: detailed enlargement. Installed at Smack Mellon Gallery, Brooklyn, NY for White Hot curated by Regine Basha and Moukhtar Kocache.

Core Samples catalogs the entirety of my high school cassette collection in miniature and presents it, in the spirit of the sixteenth and seventeenth century Wunderkammer, with less an emphasis on categorization and a greater focus on unexpected juxtapositions.1 Similar cassette collections of several key high school era friends are included to indicate the collective musical findings of a time period. I am interested in paying homage to obsolete technology and taste.

For this sculptural manifestation of Core Samples, verticality, as well as references to archaeological measuring devices, and geologic stratification, are enhanced by compressing the piece to the width of one cassette stack (from the width of fourteen in Core Samples for Cabinet Magazine), proportionally yielding a slender, sixteen foot tall sculpture. The piece is installed discretely amongst the gallery plumbing and electrical conduits in Smack Mellon Gallery in Brooklyn, NY.

1 Adalgisa Lugli, a contemporary Italian art historian, writing on Inquiry as Collection notes wryly how the seventeenth century museum “was still conceived as a place where... one could move about without having to solve or face the problem of continuity.” – Lawrence Weschler, Mr. Wilson’s Cabinet of Wonder: Pronged Ants, Horned Humans, Mice on Toast, and Other Marvels of Jurassic Technology, New York: Vintage Books, 1995; p. 83

Training: the Basic Question

Training: the Basic Question, 2000, video, color, sound, total running time 1 minutes and 46 seconds

Training: the Basic Question is a distillation of an entire informational video series created by the McDonald's corporation to regiment proper workplace etiquette and maximize production. The series has been edited, compressed, and restructured so that the logical points and authority from the original message have been transformed into an incoherent, rambling series of half completed sentences and uncomfortable silences. The video, whose purpose was to describe efficient communication techniques, is now ultimately incapable of following through on its own suggestions. Directives have been meticulously excised from the video leaving behind a pervading sense of confusion, including a number of workers who seem to have developed an uneasy relationship with their primary product, meat. Numerous images of individuals obsessively attending to and handling meat in Training: the Basic Question generate a connection between employee and product that borders on fetishistic. This project is a collaboration with Tom Kehn.

An Anchor

An Anchor, 2000, 16 drawings, ink & white-out on paper, hardbound book with newspaper cover, h 8.5 x w 5.5

I think it is all a matter of love: the more you love a memory, the stronger and stranger it is. – Vladimir Nabokov

At some point in 2000 I accidentally came across a copy of The New York Times dated Wednesday, April 21, 1999 that lodged itself in my memory for months to come. This particular copy of the Times was remarkable for the reason that it contained an article about a man named Terrance Johnson, a reporter with a camera hidden in his eyeglasses. Although a licensed social worker, he took a low paying job at a mental hospital in order to expose rampant patient mistreatment. I felt that Terrance’s humanitarian actions needed to be observed; nevertheless, I must admit that my interest in Terrance was not entirely benign. Being an image-maker myself, I felt an intense envy of his omnivorous recording.

It seems that Terrance was also aware of the awesome power that his camera eyeglasses endowed him with – just look at his expression, or more accurately, his lack of expression. I find the quirky blankness of his stare compelling because it subtly hints at a confidence imparted by the righteousness of his cause, and perhaps more significantly, by the fact that nothing can elude his observations. The fixity of his stare, as well as his emptiness, became a fascination for me.

It stood to reason that a method mirroring the intensity of Terrance’s techniques would be an appropriate starting point for an experiment. I might begin to get at something beyond the surface of the cryptic, half–toned image by staring intensely at the newspaper clipping for approximately one minute, then recreating the image from recollection. This extended method would allow a complex portrait to emerge that would both describe my subject and honor him through repetition. This would be my tribute to Terrance the undercover reporter.

The framework of serial repetition seemed simple enough; however, in short order comprehensiveness and verisimilitude gave way to an interest in scrutinizing emerging peculiarities and following their tangents. The focus became less about accumulating details into a whole than a decoding of a preexisting and surprisingly complete portrait. By increasingly relying on my recollections rather than my one-minute of actual observation, the image unlocked and allowed something unfamiliar, yet compelling to emerge.

16 drawings later I still don’t know any more about Terrance Johnson the reporter with a camera hidden in his eyeglasses, but I am very familiar with the way that his right lapel almost touches the edge of the frame, the similarity of the inverted angle of the bridge of his glasses and the open collar of his shirt, as well as the way that his eyes seem to be looking at two slightly different points. Lastly, and inexplicably, an anchor began to feature prominently in the drawings.

Core Samples (project for Cabinet Magazine, issue #2, Spring 2001)

Core Samples (project for Cabinet Magazine, issue #2, Spring 2001), 2000, c-print, h 9.75” x w 15.75”

Core Samples catalogs the entirety of my high school cassette collection in miniature and presents it, in the spirit of the sixteenth and seventeenth century Wunderkammer, with less an emphasis on categorization and a greater focus on unexpected juxtapositions. Similar cassette collections of several high school era friends are included to indicate the collective musical findings of a time period. I am interested in paying homage to obsolete technology and taste. This form of Core Samples was presented as a double page spread, or “sexy centerfold” for Cabinet magazine’s second issue.

Somewhat Corrupt = Computer Art Show

Somewhat Corrupt = Computer Art Show

Curated by Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock
Poster and card design by Dan Ellis

Including: Inez Van Lamsweerde, Sarah Sweeney, Carol Selter, Jason Salavon, Olivia Parker, Panoptic, Brian McClave, Daniel Lefcourt, Shannon Kennedy, Keith Cottingham, Amy Carr, Bill Burke, Bob Bowen, Chris Bailey, Aziz & Cucher, Romeo Alaeff

Fordham University’s Plaza Gallery
Lincoln Center Campus
113 West 60th Street at Columbus Avenue
New York, NY 10023
On view December 7, 2000 – January 31, 2001
Opening Reception: Thursday, December 7, 2000, 6 – 8 pm
The Plaza Gallery is open from 8 am – 8 pm

Hi (Human Matter)

Hi (Human Matter), 1999, Iris print, h 30” x w 23”, destroyed

One of my responsibilities while interning at a morgue was to open specimen containers and separate the pathology samples from the reusable formalin preservative. Before incinerating the samples, I would often arrange the various parts into encouraging messages. The ambiguous characteristics of the samples, along with the color, cheerful greeting, and familiarity of the Polaroid format serve to camouflage the underlying nature of the image.

Air Bud: Golden Receiver

Air Bud: Golden Receiver, 1999, video, color, sound, total running time 4 minutes and 43 seconds

Air Bud: Golden Receiver is a series of short, absurd video loops generated from footage mined from a Disney film about a golden retriever who can play football. After a shocking first viewing it seemed that the film was 100% generically commercial and devoid of any notable footage whatsoever; nevertheless, after numerous additional and more painstaking examinations a substantial number of salvageable 1–2 second fragments were located scattered throughout the 90 minute cliche. One would not imagine that a Disney project with a G rating would contain such disturbing and lewd imagery, yet exceptionally distressing scenes are all latent in the formulaic original if the film is carefully scrutinized. This project is a collaboration with Tom Kehn.

Geegaw + Scientifikk = Logikkal Trifle?

Geegaw + Scientifikk = Logikkal Trifle?, 1999, video, black & white, silent, total running time 4 seconds, looped, assorted materials, l 20’ x w 80’ (top image: 8 photographs in sequence utilized for pinhole video. bottom image: installation view of Geegaw + Scientifikk = Logikkal Trifle? for Ruins in Reverse, CEPA Gallery, Buffalo, NY)

In this show the photographic act is paired down to its bare minimum with the entire show functioning as an exploded view of all the factors that come into play to make a single photographically generated, animated image. In December 1998, the two artists began a three-day trip to make a simple, animated loop of a yet unknown object in the State of New York Medical Examiners office in Buffalo. Over the next three days, the artists traveled from New York City’s Pennsylvania Station to Buffalo, NY, researched within the medical examiners office, and made the eight pinhole photographs that would comprise the final animation. The animation is comprised of 8 black & white images circling a ceiling mounted video camera in the room where autopsies take place. The video camera sends a live feed of the deceased from the autopsy room to a separate room where body identification takes place.

All objects that were utilized in the preparation and production of the animation were collected and stored into an ever-increasing number of trash bags. Weeks after the initial production of the images the bags were brought into the clinical workspace of the gallery, whereupon, employing subjective memory and pseudo-scientific cataloging practices, the artifacts – ranging from ticket stubs and food wrappers, to duct tape and clothing worn during production – were organized with the goal of reconstructing the original narrative. The resultant display takes on the logical form of a timeline, or wake of a ship leading up to the creation of the animation; however, branching out from this sequence are the tangents, digressions, and embellishments that occur when theory, memory, and history merge. This project is a collaboration with Brian McClave.

In the Jaws 3 of Poltergeist III

In the Jaws 3 of Poltergeist III, 1999, video, color, sound, total running time 2 minutes and 11 seconds

In the Jaws 3 of Poltergeist III collapses formulaic sequels from two lucrative movie franchises (Jaws 3 and Poltergeist III) into one hybrid creation containing all salvageable elements from the trivial originals. What was once bloated and collectively three hours and 17 minutes long becomes synopsized into a lean 2 minute and 11 second story concerning a young girl’s purging of a traumatic and watery past. A psychologist claustrophobically covers the child’s face with his large hand, repeatedly massaging out distressing memories – surveillance cameras panning across Florida lagoons and Chicago high rise lobbies, terrified people running through underwater tunnels and high rise hallways, as well as circumstantially more bizarre moments – a man dramatically tumbling out of an uncontrollable golf cart. Likewise, secondary characters continually cover their faces, as if in sympathy for the girl, or in desperation for the films in which they are acting to miraculously transform into cohesive and less ludicrous productions. The hypnotic repetition of the mumbled word “breathe,” by the psychologist seems to be equally applicable advice to the remainder of the B-list actors frantically scrambling about in the convoluted plots so typical for the third film of a dying series. Additionally, explosions of acrylic glass feature prominently in both movies, but were not utilized in In the Jaws 3 of Poltergeist III. This project is a collaboration with Tom Kehn.

The Pathos of JFKurosawa

The Pathos of JFKurosawa, 1999, video, color, sound, total running time 38 seconds

The Pathos of JFKurosawa merges together audio from the climactic finale of Akira Kurosawa’s 1949 film Stray Dog with a three second video clip from Oliver Stone’s 1991 film JFK; yet the result formed by the new combination is certainly at variance with the intention of either director. Through live recording of manually “scrubbing the time line” (rapidly scrolling forwards and backwards through the video footage) a pathologist is made to continuously and excitedly inspect one of John F. Kennedy’s bullet exit wounds with the tip of his gloved finger. Coupled with Stray Dog’s crescendo of uncontrolled sobbing – the apprehension of the killer after 122 minutes – the originally brief and clinical procedure is altered into something emotionally cathartic, torturously extended, and darkly erotic.

Sixteen Candles

Sixteen Candles, 1998, video, color, sound, total running time 36 seconds

Sixteen Candles is a surgical substitution of one character for another in the 1984 John Hughes film Sixteen Candles. The character of Samantha Baker (played by Molly Ringwald) is replaced with “The Geek” (played by Anthony Michael Hall) in a fantasy sequence between Ringwald and the handsome boy of her dreams, Jake Ryan (Michael Schoeffling). What was once a stock romantic scene for a mid-80’s teen movie becomes slightly less stock as a result of the new dynamic, as well as explicitly sexual due to the addition of new overdubbed dialogue. This project is a collaboration with Tom Kehn.

Based on the True Story of Rocky Dennis

Based on the True Story of Rocky Dennis, 1999, video, color, sound, total running time 2 minutes and 9 seconds

Based on the True Story of Rocky Dennis extracts, rearranges, and loops scenes from the 1985 Peter Bogdanovich film Mask in order to highlight the acutely manipulative aspects of the film. What becomes evident after successive viewings of Mask and the second filmic ingredient, Deliverance, directed by John Boorman in 1972, is that tender stories and appalling stories are equally as brutal in exploiting audience emotions. Saccharine moments from Mask – an excessively heartfelt story about the struggles of a highly intelligent boy with serious disfiguring cranial enlargements to overcome prejudice – are juxtaposed with the most disturbing scene of depravity from Deliverance – the notoriously violent sodomy of Bobby (Ned Beatty).

Contrasting the endless scenes from Mask that illustrate the noblest aspects of humanity with Deliverance’s wanton violation might seem extremely crude and provoke hasty reactions of disapproval; nevertheless, this deliberate poisoning of the well effectively brings into sharp relief the manner in which audience emotions have been manipulated by maudlin characters and implausible actions from the very beginning. The film equation presented in Based on the True Story of Rocky Dennis might not be liked, but it demands acknowledgement as simply a different product of the same language utilized in the source films. This project is a collaboration with Tom Kehn.

The Pathos of Richard Dreyfus

The Pathos of Richard Dreyfus, 1998, video, color, sound, total running time 8 minutes and 50 seconds

The Pathos of Richard Dreyfus collects and strings together in chronological order every scene from Steven Spielberg’s film Close Encounters of the Third Kind in which the Devil’s Tower in Wyoming appears. Regardless of the duration of the scene, if the Devil’s Tower appeared on screen in Close Encounters of the Third Kind, it was included in The Pathos of Richard Dreyfus. From glimpses of the Devil’s Tower in pencil sketches, to zooms into maps, to tracking shots around mashed potato sculptures of the tower, to the actual tower itself – the obsessive collecting of imagery in The Pathos of Richard Dreyfus mirrors the fanatical qualities that mark the movie’s misunderstood protagonists.

The soundtrack for the piece is a repeated five second sample of a rising string buildup with an agitated Richard Dreyfus gutturally barking “not right, not right – not right,” while failing to give sculptural form to his mysterious vision of the yet unseen Devil’s Tower. The audio loops for the duration of the piece and briefly synchronizes when it reaches the video source from which it was extracted. This project is a collaboration with Tom Kehn.

The Pathos of Anthony Michael Hall

The Pathos of Anthony Michael Hall, 1998, video, color, sound, total running time 2 minutes and 56 seconds

The Pathos of Anthony Michael Hall is a 2 minute and 56 second investigation of a 5 second clip from the John Hughes film Sixteen Candles. The scene has been so savaged through live video scratching that the narrative flow of the original message has been entirely obliterated. All remaining signs point to the fact that the character of Jake (flannel shirt), despite being the object of many a straightforward romantic fantasy, is ultimately involved in a sadomasochistic relationship as evidenced by his brutal treatment of the young Anthony Michael Hall (trapped under table).

Sitings

A Methodical Elimination of Drudgery; Crude, but Adequate

A Methodical Elimination of Drudgery; Crude, but Adequate, 1996, room 1: washing machine, shelf, fluorescent light, audio #1 total running time 3 minutes and 38 seconds, looped; room 2: distillation system, 2 buckets, dirty clothes, shelf, Polaroids, specimen containers, forms, audio #2 total running time 3 minutes and 25 seconds, looped, w 25’ x d 15’ (installation detail)

This exhibition examines a procedure in its entirety. The first room of A Methodical Elimination of Drudgery; Crude, but Adequate contains an abandoned washing machine that has been clinically dismantled piece by piece. The machine is displayed in its sum; each fragment carefully arranged on a shelf running the perimeter of the room. Accompanying each element from the washer is an identifying time-coded placard indicating the moment at which that individual piece was removed from the whole machine. The room is cold and empty, aside from the disassembled parts and a fluorescent light. A poignant country song repeats endlessly at a low volume (Making Plans, from Trio, 1987, Emmylou Harris, Dolly Parton, and Linda Ronstadt, written by Johnny Russell/Voni Morrison).

The second room contains an elaborate and theatrical distillation system that extracts dirt from the artist’s clothes worn during the production and upkeep of the exhibition. The results are recorded and cataloged each day. Shelves hold sample jars containing dirty laundry water, the clean water that was generated, residual dirt, and Polaroids of the clothing worn. An exaggerated soundtrack of boiling and bubbling (blowing through a straw into a cup of water) pervades the room. This project is a collaboration with Brian McClave.

Making Plans, total running time 3 minutes and 38 seconds, from Trio, 1987, Emmylou Harris, Dolly Parton, and Linda Ronstadt, written by Johnny Russell/Voni Morrison:

You say tomorrow you're going
It's so hard for me to believe
I'm making plans for the heartaches
'Cause you're making plans to leave
The tears for me will be falling
Like a tree shedding its leaves
I'm making plans for the teardrops
'Cause you're making plans to leave
You're making plans to forget me
I'm making plans to miss you
I'm getting ready to grieve
I'm making plans to be lonesome
'Cause you're making plans to leave
I'm making plans to be lonesome
'Cause you're making plans to leave

A Home

Four Women in a Nursing Home, 1994, gelatin silver print, h 4” x w 5”

Middleschool

Middleschool, 1990–1991, twenty gelatin silver prints, h 16” x w 20”

Hampshire College Main Gallery, Amherst, MA

Hospital

Hospital, 1988–1989, twenty gelatin silver prints, h 20” x w 16”