Steele Conditt, Benning July vs. V-Log Festival

The various works screened in class Monday all have the same theme--personal, up close, explorations of self within the confines of the video medium, whether 3 CCD zoom or pixelvision or cell phone.

The videos mostly all contained close-up framing and intimate diary type conversations. An intimate exchange between the artist and the viewer as if you've known each other for years, yet in each case you've just met. The amateur YouTube artists are artists none the less just like the ones we viewed in class. Benning's diary with the Pixelvision camera is no different than the upload from SadEyedAnimeGirl who parks the camera in front of her face and rambles on about life. If Benning can become famous, why not this girl. The videos have the same feel of a person who is lonely and trying to connect with the world and wants people to listen to her and care.

The videos from class also contain a lot of repetitive movements. Conditt's editing style shows many of the same clips reinserted throughout the piece, such as the woman sliding down a mattress. Steele's exploration of body doesn't simply point and move on, she emphasizes each scar with repetitive tracing of the scars with her finger. The eyes linger on the tracing motion almost more than the scars themselves. Acconci keeps moving his body towards the camera and away as he drones about loving the viewer. July's piece fixates on body motions of the surveilled woman, who moves around in the space while staring at the surveillance camera.

Each piece draws a viewer close to a screen, beckons the viewer to participate in their life and rantings or delusions. Each explores the boundary of private versus public and the breaking down of those boundaries in displaying these works in a public arena.

YouTube is the experimental forum of today and it's participants are finding recognition as viable artisans same as in the days of early video. It begs the question though...will this enamored viewing of these types of works last or is it merely a phase that will pass as the next type of medium is born?

Vito Acconci

Psychological and confrontational. These are two words used to describe Acconci's works from the 70's. He wants to clash against the norm, to push himself onto the viewer and cause them to think. In achieving this aim he is largely successful. He indeed manages to invade one's comfort zone to the point of intense discomfort.

Carl spoke accurately in mentioning the creep factor, Acconci is quite abrasive and almost reminds me of a serial rapist in leer and tone. This is exactly the way he wants to draw in the viewer. He wants them to experience himself and his body up close and personal on the small 13 inch (or so) video monitor he would have been projected on in a 1970's gallery installation. The graininess and lack of editing abilities did in fact create limitations that artists needed to work around when conceptualizing their pieces. Acconci chose an abrasive and confrontational direct address approach and desired the viewer to see him life-size in the small video screen and feel as though they might come right into the space with him.

Many of his methods and ideas of video making are no longer relevant or necessary due to the advances in technology and I wonder if due to these advances it would explain Acconci's shift to now more architechtural artistic approaches. Once the medium lost its inherent video qualities and became more cinematic maybe he no longer felt it had the same appeal and interest. Maybe he simply got out all of his sexual angst in the 70's and has since mellowed with age. I don't know the answer to that, but to see the wide changes in technology over the past 35 years is amazing and possibly for him not a positive thing in light of how video should be for everyone but now video is largely among the ranks of the film. YouTube and Google videos still remain the low-tech voice of the people, accessible to all with a camera and waiting to be viewed by whoever desires. Acconci in his day would have thrived in this realm, though I have a feeling the censor's would have pulled his work down based on his provocative subject matter. :)