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(3.5 MB Quicktime clip)
Date: Mon, 11 Sep 1995 16:59:49 -0400
A Self Defining Object
- “Plunder Squad” is entirely constructed of appropriated elements from TV cop shows in rerun, reality-based police dramas and pulp novels. Within “Plunder Squad,” multiple parallel streams of text and image, each containing widely disparate narrative elements, compete for the viewer’s attention. These elements, designed to move the viewer/reader through a narrative to its conclusion, provoke in us a desire to resolve these unstable layers into a congruous story . In this case, however, there is no story. Instead the resolution of narrative is replaced by an accumulation of elements deprived of their structure. The impulse to complete a narrative string is thwarted by both the disjunction of those elements and the sheer volume of visual information. The horizontal left to right movement of text across the screen mimics the reading process and the reader’s rush to narrative closure while the shifting fields of video image and aural noise mock this attempt at coherence. Accidentally, images and texts combine, inform and comment on each other. Pulled from the stream of mass culture, these reclaimed narrative moments reveal the mechanics of their effect even as they shed the burden of content. As our focus shifts between the moving layers we may chose to drift within the video — we may overload — we may find ourselves watching only a glowing object moving across our screens.
Next Thanks to Rick Provine for technical assistance
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