LIGHT WORK I
2006, 16mm/HDCAM, 8 minutes
LIGHT WORK I is a haunting and impressionistic video that connects the industrial and medical transformations of the early-mid 20th Century, with the present day digital revolutions in music and movies and the implied demise of 16mm film.
LIGHT WORK I sprung out of the immersive expanded cinema performance Light Work Mood Disorder created by collaborators Jennifer Reeves and composer Anthony Burr. In LIGHT WORK I Reeves recorded the process of making the direct-on-16mm-film for Light Work Mood Disorder with High Definition macro shooting, and composites this magnified documentation with shots from the original performance film. The soundtrack is a layered mix of multi-tonal bass clarinet, organ, electronics and sine waves, creating a musical composition out of both “real world” analog instruments and the invisible digital realm. Symbols of 20th century science, industry, medicine and madness are mixed in rhythmic molecular forms, morphing frequencies and colorful visual textures. Educational films (depicting factory assembly lines, X-rays, scientific experiments, etc.) are sewn together on a sewing machine, and covered with melted down pharmaceuticals affixed to the film.