Impermanence, Single Channel Video, 2011

7 min 31 sec, 1920 x 1080 HD

 

Impermanence, shot in Times Square, reveals the unseen layers of movement through time. I see this space of moving digital architecture and fast-paced crowds as a physical representation of our electronic culture, an icon of media saturation. I want to place my viewer in an alternative dimension of time. When encountering the video, one is met with stark black and white flashing images of people and many levels of grey tones as the past layers of time start to fade out of sight. If something or someone moves within the composition, they are imaged as white, and as they move from one place to the other, they leave trails of time behind them. 

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As the crowds of people move through the screen leaving trails of time, they layer on top of each other, intertwining past and present times. I focused on the different kinds of time that I could perceive in Times Square. I found many onlookers and people taking a moment to sit still and take in the environment. I sought out these stationary people within the crowds and placed them as focusing points of my compositions, as people continued to shuffle by behind them. The resulting image created a silhouette of contrasted time. Not only are others’ movements surrounding them, but the other is also defining them. The images are revealed to us like memories, flickering insubstantial forms that periodically give rise to vague details that are always in a state of flux.

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