Artist: Sam Taylor Wood
Title: A Little Death
Sam Taylor Woods' 'A Little Death' is a video which runs approximately 4 minutes long and shows a deceased hare and a peach on a table. The video is sped up and over time the hare begins to decompose and is slowly eaten away by maggots and flies until the hare is longer recognisable, meanwhile during this process the peach is left untouched.
The video explores the process of what happens to when a living thing dies, and in the video we see that it is a very slow and steady process, however by speeding the video we are able to appreciate the stages of what happens when something dies.
The hare, along with how it is positioned, is similar to the traditional Vanitas paintings of the 16th/17th century. The Latin noun 'Vanitas -atis' can be roughly translated to the word empty or emptiness, and this can be clearly seen in Wood's work when the hare is slowly eaten away from the inside until there is nothing left and along with its single lighting we can clearly understand with what is being presented to us.
Title - The Clock
The work of Christian Marclay and video installation is a very unique one. The overall video runs for 24 hours. However what makes this piece unique is that the video consists of carefully assembled clips from various movies which feature clocks and watches, the overall video is then synced in real time.
Marclay took 2 years to complete the video and all the clips blend together in a smooth motion, just like time. The video explores the human obsession with time and how this is very important and valuable in our lives. Ironically people are coming to watch a video literally about time and this leads to the audience response, that many people, whilst watching the video, actually lose a sense of time.
Artist - Tony Oursler
Title - Influence Machine
Tony Ousler's Influence Machine takes advantage of landscape and architecture within London. The footage projects various characters and what makes the work stand out is that it is projected on various areas, such as buildings, trees, landscape, smoke etc.
Spending 2 years researching the 'virtual image'. This involved him going through history such as when the first camera was introduced along with the progression and development of media and technology such as film, television and the internet. Whilst exploring different mediums he questioned whether or not the technology available in the present day had been already used, surely enough it was and this was his linking structure to developing and completing the influence machine.
The aim is get people to notice what is being projected. Since this is not the standard projection on a white board it gets peoples' attention immediately.
