Multimedia

In looking back at our memories, we are left to reassemble the pieces and evaluate the moments. Often times the results leave us uneasy as we consider how the circumstances and outcomes could have been different. As we resurrect these moments, however, we often fight to reshape them as a way of coming to terms with the power that they hold over us.

The sound for the work is produced from a single wind chime sample that has been heavily manipulated and processed. The video is constructed from still images that are broken down through an altering of the hexadecimal code. No color corrections or alterations have been made following the code deterioration. After these minimal materials are destroyed, they are carefully reconstructed to form a new, reworked memory.

I Looked at the Pieces and Still I Wonder Why (2013/15)

I Looked

If Thou Return

6 channel sound installation

If Thou Return, We Return is a site specific, 6-channel sound installation developed for the 21st Annual Watermill Summer Benefit and installed in the entry grasses of The Watermill Center. The work incorporated the recitation of fragmented texts from the 1,001 Nights stories. The texts were selected, read, and recorded in partnership with participants in the Watermill International Summer Program, the Summer Documentation Team, and by director and designer Robert Wilson.

developed in partnership with: Lovis Ostenrik (Germany), Nina Chalot (France), Jake Jeon (South Korea/USA), Dawood Hilmandi (Afghanistan/The Netherlands), David Markovic (Czech Republic), and Jakub Jahn (Czech Republic).

text read by: José Macian (UK/Spain), Kate Eberstadt (USA), Gintare Minelgaite (Lithuania), Matt Petty (USA), Jake Jeon (South Korea/USA), Kalliopi Simou (Greece), Jessica-Brittany Smith (USA), Kayije Kagame (Rwanda/Switzerland), Dawood Hilmandi (Afghanistan/The Netherlands), Lovis Ostenrik (Germany), Carlos Soto (USA), and Robert Wilson (USA).

First presented on July 26, 2014 at The Watermill Center in Water Mill, New York.

If Thou Return, We Return (2014)

Anchor 1

Circuit Bendr is an interactive sound installation controlled with a hand built human interface device (HID) which triggers sounds and live processing within a Max / MSP patch. The soundscape is created through the triggering of arcade buttons which are each connected to sound effects harvested from children's toys. The yellow buttons trigger the sounds in their original speed, the green buttons trigger a slower speed, and the red buttons play the samples back twice as fast. The purple buttons control sound processing effects that alter the soundscape in real time.

Circuit Bendr (2014-2015)

Circuit Bendr

Trivialities

Trivialities (2018)

single-channel video and stereo audio

The audio components are derived from the margins and interstices of anti-gay propaganda films from Mid-Century America. The video draws upon similar material from period adult films. In combining these materials, a dialogue emerges about how identity is constructed in the moments that happen between extremes. When we are forced to find a balance between allowing others to trivialize us or in turn trivialize ourselves.

Shifts

single-channel video installation

As we look back at the moments in our lives that have had a significant role in shaping our identity, we are often confronted with a gradual shift in perspective. While the essence of the moment remains the same, we are unable to reflect on our past without seeing it through the point of view of our present.

Shifts is an ongoing series of video works that each make use of a defined set of colors, recurring images, and distinct sound worlds. Although the images are carefully selected to recount memories from my own past, they are intentionally left as open-ended prompts to allow the viewer to find their own meaning and to recount their own memories.

Shifts (ongoing)

Still from Shifts VI

Still from Shifts III

Still from Shifts V

Still from Shifts I

Video Postcards

single-channel video installation

The series of video postcards was created following a trip to Reykjavik, Iceland. Each postcard combines video or still image from Iceland with collected objects from my home using chroma key technology. The videos serve as a play on the physical postcards popularly sent from exotic travel destinations and explore notions of modern communication, storytelling, and human impact on the environment.

Postcard 1.1 (fan) - "By the Light of the Silvery Moon," recorded by Fats Waller (1942)

Postcard 1.2 (conch) - Movement I from L'Apotheose de Corelli by Francois Couperin, recorded by Claude Monteux, Harry Shulman, Bernard Greenhouse, and Sylvia Marlowe (1953)

Postcard 1.3 (clippers) - "On the Good Ship Lollipop," recorded by Shirley Temple for Bright Eyes (1934)

Postcard 1.4 (tissue box) - Night by Adam Lenz, recorded by Zachary Boyt

Video Postcards (2015)

Video Postcard 1.1 (fan)

Video Postcard 1.2 (conch)

Video Postcard 1.3 (clippers)

Video Postcard 1.4 (tissue box)

charcoal drawings and sound installation

A Way Of Providing Ventilation is a multidisciplinary project examining the history and architecture of the tobacco sheds in Windsor, Connecticut. The project is formed around a series of ten charcoal drawings, created by Adam Lenz while in residence at the Windsor Art Center in fall of 2020. The drawings abstractly reflect on the landscape, architecture, and imagined airflow patterns of the regional tobacco sheds and are intended to serve as graphic scores - documents that incorporate graphics as a means of conveying musical directions in lieu of standardized Western musical notation. The drawings were interpreted by multi-instrumentalist and improviser Zach Rowden, forming the basis of a multi-channel sound installation. The project was presented in Fall 2020 during an exhibition at Windsor Art Center. It forms the start of an ongoing body of work that continues to examine the sheds through further drawings, musical compositions, and a forthcoming album.

A Way Of Providing Ventilation (2015)

A Way Of Providing Ventilation