Jaakko Pallasvuo, Utopia, video (still), 2013. 6 minutes, 40 seconds. Courtesy of the artist.
Normal Reality at Milner Library
August 3 - October 12, 2015
University Galleries is partnering with Milner Library to display 12 videos from Normal Reality on a large flat screen television in the stairwell on the third floor landing during all hours of operation August 3 through October 12.
Normal Reality presents twelve artists from the U.S., Canada, and Europe, whose embrace of popular digital technologies raises questions about normalcy in the age of accessibility. The artists featured in Normal Reality are guided by the exploratory concerns laid out by early video practitioners, but the environments they navigate are accessed largely through a multilayered and ultra-fragmented media experience of gaming, 24/7 Internet access, social media posting at a stoplight, and GPS. This experience is a given: digital reality is reality, Facebook is our forum, and posting pictures of where we are and what we are eating is increasingly how we define ourselves.
This collaborative project explores inventive ways to provide sustainable and accessible art for diverse communities at Illinois State University. Because of its flexibility in presentation and familiarity in format, video-based artwork is the perfect medium to capture the attention of unsuspecting viewers, and to transform passive viewing into engagement and curiosity. These particular videos are very accessible; they are colorful, with entrancing visuals and subjects. This project aims to not only expose the campus community to contemporary art in places they normally visit, but to shift the public's perspective on how, where, and when they can view art.
This project is organized by University Galleries’ Curator Jason Judd, and is supported in part by the Illinois Arts Council.
Videos on display
Sparkling I, 2010
Petra Cortright
Webcam video, 1:35 minutes
Courtesy of the artist and Foxy Production, New York
Performing in front of a built-in webcam with preset digital effects, Petra Cortright (Los Angeles) nonchalantly waves a tree branch like a magic wand that dissolves into sparkling star effects with its own fairytale like soundtrack.
Magic Show, 2015
Mariam Graff
Single channel video, 13:26 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Mariam Graff’s, Magic Show, staged in a “green screen” studio and features multiple characters all played by herself, uses kitschy special effects and theater-like narrative to reference the creation of identity through the relationship between technology, entertainment, and ultimately the inner workings of the artistic process itself.
The Realm of Nothingness, 2013
Kathy Rose
Single channel video, 5:41 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Kathy Rose is known for the hand-drawn animated films she made in the 1970s and dance-related films in the 1980s and 90s, which led ultimately to her current videos inspired by Japanese Noh theater.
Island Light, 2013
Andrew Rosinski
35mm film transferred to single channel, HD video, 3:00 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Sound design by Morgan Evans-Weiler
In Island Light, Andrew Rosinski uses rhythmic repetitions of nostalgic still images from vacation photos to create storylines that are periodically broken by kaleidoscopic abstractions of airplanes, clouds, and the sun.
Utopia, 2014
Jaakko Pallasvuo
Single channel video, 6:40 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
In Utopia, Jaakko Pallasvuo dispassionately relates, in the manner of director's commentary on a DVD, his failure to capture in video—as opposed to language—the essence of an idyllic Swedish landscape we view on the screen.
MindPlace ThoughtStream, 2014
Shana Moulton
Single channel video, 11:57 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Shana Moulton explores contemporary anxieties through her filmic alter ego, Cynthia, who in MindPlace ThoughtStream searches for psychological and physical wellness through ultra-commoditized products that result in disorientation rather than piece of mind.
The Land Behind, 2013
Sabrina Ratté
Single channel video, 4:56 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Sound by Roger Tellier-Craig
Sabrina Ratté’s videos are reminiscent of broken tube televisions. Unlike the strange lines made by degraded TVs, her abstract lines dance and move around the screen with intention and grace, manipulated either by her hand or by video processing.
I might, in the end, be no more than a reflection of your imagination, 2014
Rosa Menkman
Xilitla game recording, 1:30 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Rosa Menkman’s video game Xilitla was inspired by the Gardens of Las Pozas—deep in the northern mountains of Mexico—where an eccentric British millionaire, Edward James, created a garden as absurd as an Escher drawing. The video game recording mimics the pathways to nowhere in a digital garden with a faceless white character who can be seen as a stand-in for James or, perhaps, ourselves.
central~lattice, 2013
Brenna Murphy, Single channel video, 1:04 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Brenna Murphy’s psychedelic video central~lattice fuses real yet banal footage and three-dimensional rendered objects, suggesting connections between ancient forms like mandalas and current technology.
QTzrk_loop, 2011
Jon Satrom
Single channel video, 3:12 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Jon Satrom controls a glitch when he opens a Quicktime video of a shark hunting a seal, unleashing a symphony of ecstatic computer windows that reproduce and disintegrate into a chaotic yet formally appealing meltdown.
floVV, 2011
Malgosia Woznica
Single channel video, 10:24 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Audio by AIM23 - "Distant Silence"
In floVV, Malgosia Woznica, otherwise known as V5mt, slowly distorts images of ancient sculptures and pop icons revealing that the digital image is as malleable as paint or clay.
Implicit Bias - ghost in the shell, 2013
Wolfie E. Rawk
Screen recording, 5:44 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Wolfie E. Rawk is a transgender artist who, in a screen recording of a Google search, begins to type a series of possible questions, but before Rawk can complete their sentences, Google automatically finishes the question with previous popular searches, thus reflecting the collision of multifaceted personal and cultural elements involved in the creation of stereotypes.