Spaced (2006, 28 MB, 3:31 min.)
Documentation from Tony Oursler‘s exhibition at the Margo Leavin Gallery.
The works mixrs video and cialis professional physical objects, poetic texts and actual music
gleaned from the recordings of deep space by NASA.
Black or White, the Gravy Version (2010, 58 MB, 2:38 min.)
An outing, or perhaps more a forced march, for Michael Jackson’s
Black or White refracted through the prism of English
whimsy that is Edward Picot (well, on occasion; fans will know
his range is much, much broader) with co-conspirator Hoola Hoop Kid.
Never understood the Jackson appeal myself but this I like a great deal.
Wish, though, they’d called it ‘Black or White, the Gravy Mix‘.
Lick Yourselves (2005, 64MB, 6:27 min, silent)
The Little Artists are a UK collaborative duo, most famous/notorious
for their re-renderings of iconic artworks in the childrens’ construction toy
LEGO.
This brief description doesn’t do them justice – their work is rich & complex
& they make hay, playfully but profoundly too, with all sorts of contemporary
obsessions – remix &appropriation, branding, celebrity & not least the idea of
artistry/creativity itself.
This video stems from their 2005 show based on the work of Mark Quinn, the casting-
his-head-out-of-his-own-frozen-blood guy, and the show featured them dressing
up as ice cream salespeople and flogging fruit flavour ice lolly replicas of
the Quinn piece.
The vid is a minimal, leisurely and ever so slightly disturbing account of
one of these slowly melting.
I must declare an interest – I wrote an essay for their new book, which, if
your appetite is whetted, you can get here.
The New Miranda (2003, 38MB, 2:17 min)
Blooper – Voodoo Chicks (200?, 1MB, 16 secs)
The Engines of Truth (2000?, 20MB, 5:08 min)
Our Patrick Lichty season resumes after quite the longest break ever,
partly because I misplaced the files he so generously gave us
in 2007.
Looking through these again it comes home very forcefully what
a significant role Lichty played in the development of a new language of art video,
one contemporaneous with the birth pangs and development of net art & later to
feed centrally into online art practice.
The pieces still impress as hugely imaginative and sometimes challenging
and apart from their physical size and compression don’t appear time worn
at all. In fact, in many ways they seem amazingly prescient, perhaps
even ahead of their time.
More soon.
Frank Talking #1 (2010, 157 MB, 9:59 min.)
Frank Talking #2 (2010, 247 MB, 9:51 min.)
Two more episodes in Edward Picot’s satirical but affectionate
insider view of the British NHS.
Latest episode in Edward Picot’s splendid Dr Hairy sequence.
The Wicker Man (2010, 12 MB, 1:09 min)
The Wicker Man Live (2010, 7 MB, 3:31 min)
Rupert Howe is always doing interesting things.
He’s also an early adopter of the sort of tech that in-my-old-age I
would cautiously leave a few months to see how it turns
out, so many of the interesting things he does mystify me
somewhat at first.
SO.. here he seems to have got given (?) lots of extras
(in what universe does this occur?) to remake a section of
cult British horror film The Wicker Man on Hampstead Heath.
The results are jaw dropping in two ways.
Jaw droppingly charmingly-funny.
And jaw droppingly odd.
Most of his work is essentially some combination of these
two axes. ( Plus serious skills)
As an added bonus there a kind of Making-Of-The-Wicker-Man-Remake
which apparently was originally streamed live from his mobile.
I didn’t even know you could do that.
If anything the ‘making-of’ piece surpasses the substantive one on the
Howe strangeness scale. Even his friends & colleagues seem touched too
by a species of benign insanity.
Long may he flourish.
Amazing (2005, 4.1MB, 2:02 min.)
I found this in my DVblog to-do folder & embarassingly
I can’t remember when or from where I downloaded it.*
If anyone can oblige please mail us.
Anyway, it made me laugh quite immoderately.
* Update -the splendid Sam Renseiw rides to the rescue with
this link.
Please Don’t Look Like A Pear (2010, 10 MB, 3:22 min)
I love Donna Kuhn’s work.
I’ve rhapsodised about it here before, so I’ll just note, first,
that she continues to develop in the most thoughtful & interesting of ways
& second that this video is very funny, poetic
& scarier than most horror movies.
( Donna: ‘people don’t believe that these are completely unembellished
craigslist personals ads’)
To do all three – a coup!
More soon please Donna!
Monster/Identity Prosthetic (2009, 54 MB, 1:13 min)
Documentation from last years Spark Festival of a rather splendid
installation by Todd Polenberg.
companjeros (2001, 17 MB, 1:16 min)
los homeboys (2001, 37 MB, 6:34 min)
Ali el fofo & Don Conejo. unplugged 2001 ticotaco
By Max Moswitzer.
Danny Tanner (2010, 11 MB, 1:14 min.)
“Derek Larson is concerned with “working with his hands” in the sculptural space
inside video and in blurring the lines between social and media spaces.
He describes his intention to close his videos in a “culturally dependent,
feedback-loop” and, as a sculptor, is attracted to video’s infinite reproducibility.
His works appropriate the methodologies and deadpan humor of tactical media while
drawing a focus on its formal qualities and relationships in lieu of fixed and pointed content.”
LOUIS V. E.S.P.
Geisterschloss (2006, 4MB, 1:49 min.)
787 Cliparts (2006, 10.6MB, 1:05 min. loop)
Earlyish stuff from the now seemingly ubiquitous Oliver Laric.
Dr Hairy’s Address to the Nation (2010, 69 MB, 9:42 min)
With the UK general election coming up on Thursday
here’s Edward Picot’s Dr Hairy putting in his three penn’orth.
Whilst previous efforts have been more straighforwardly satirical
this is simply, and quite splendidly, barking…
Because it *is* funny ( the vicar punchline being my favourite)
it’s easy to overlook how much Picot has developed as
a filmmaker -there’s a quite individual and original syntax at work here,
deployed confidently and effectively throughout.
Dark Stars (2006, 6.9MB, 1:30 min)
Two rather attractive & intriguing pieces by Marisa Olson
made at a 2006 residency at the Experimental Television Center.
Said Marisa:
“Both are made using a combination of analog & digital processes
and Dark Stars is almost completely analog.. but
then again, both appropriate found material from the internet.
From Here is the music video for Zach Layton’s remix of my song of the
same name. Dark Stars uses samples from one of those old VHS video
games”.
More from Marisa on DVblog here.
Private Charges ( 2010, 51MB, 9:59)
Another bit of pointed fun from the team who brought you
the original Dr Hairy movie.
Made me laugh a lot, especially the superb timing and the
gratuitous cruelty to toy animals.
Shouldn’t need saying, especially with this one, but, US
viewers, please see the disclaimer on the original post.
Elephants (2008, 9MB, 1:19 min.)
Flatheads (2008, 2MB, 30 sec.)
3 commercials for Samsung, Axion and Fruit Roll-Ups
by inspiring director – Keith Schofield.
19th ( 2010, 1MB, 1:00 min, silent)
Are You Ready? ( 2008, 20MB, 52 secs)
Two contrasting short movies from Leeds, UK, artist Kate Dickinson.
The second should provoke a smile (did for me) but it’s
the first, in which not a great deal happens & in a deliberately
confined area of the screen to boot, that I particularly liked.
There’s a melancholy about its view of an overcast
Leeds landscape which is amplified by cropping a good deal of it out.
The resulting minimalism marshalls the viewer’s attention in a quite hypnotic way.
London Hospital ( 2010, 49MB, 9:59)
Writer & artist Edward Picot doubles as an administrator
in the UK health service & lets his hair down with this
deeply odd but amusing bit of lo-fi puppetry made in
collaboration with Julian Le Saux & Dr David Hindmarsh.
Just in case there are any knuckleheads out there
(and of course this is unlikely as you have the good taste
to read DVblog) who imagine this is an attack of any sort on
socialised medicine, the authors have kindly provided the
following statement:
“The creators of this piece would like to point out that they all work in
the National Health Service and are completely devoted to it.”
Fun with Muybridge (2009, 18 MB, 1:30 min)
Conversations with Eadweard J. Muybridge.
By Wreck & Salvage – a package of three video producers:
Erik Nelson, Adam Quirk & Aaron Valdez
Music by Kevin Bewersdorf.
