Three Cities, Rivers, Monuments

My art investigates urban experience and its representation through performance and video.  During recent years, I have made videos that record the relationship between human masses and the architecture that defines and directs them.  I make these videos in the following manner: I film my motif from a fixed camera position.  I render the video footage transparent and cut it into one-minute segments.  I layer these segments on top of each other so that, during one minute, the viewer sees the entire 60-minute video in real time, yet simultaneously as multiple layers.  Consequently, time and motion oscillate to the extent that they seem to stop.  In contrast to these layered ‘still’ videos, I make another type of video in select urban sites: I submerge my camera in the sea or river of the city, recording its skyline seen from the viewpoint of a fish.  As the camera bounces in and out of the waves, it records glimpses of edifices, tourists, boats, and passers-by.  Monuments, people, and pieces of trash in murky waters all become part of a world seemingly helter-skelter, in transition, and volatile.