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Mobile Exposure 2006
CATALOG NO. 577
TYPE Shorts Compilation, Art / Artist, Short Collection
YEAR 2006
RUNNING TIME
DVD, REGION0
TV SYSTEM NTSC

SYNOPSIS FILMS IN PROGRAM SCREENINGS PRESS PURCHASE / LICENSING
Curated by Stephanie Martz

Executive Curator: Patrick Lichty

While viewing the submissions for this year's Mobile Exposure Festival in contrast to last year's submissions I was struck by the large number of videos that referenced not just the beginnings of film, but also the rise of photography. This historical reference appeared to be a way for today's moving image artists to orient their video practices within the new mobile camera devices so readily available now. This is apparent in Anthony Wong's humorous piece, “Cell Phone” which plays off of the once feared belief (when photography was introduced to the public) that when one's image is photographed, one's soul is somehow locked within the print. Wong takes this idea further and shows a cell phone camera not just capturing a soul but the actual body. In addition to Wong's short, “Freerun” by Henry Reichhold and “Mobile Edison Remake no ◦5” by Catherine Ramus both use clips from early cinema footage and then connect them to our present day. Yet both of the filmmakers' approaches are different. Reinhold's video connects the drudgery of early twentieth century factory life to an ability to escape through the whimsical space allowed through technology, reminding me of a recent visit to New York City where iPods are a must for subway commuters. Ramus pairs Edison's footage of two men boxing to a contemporary newspaper clipping showing a meager looking sperm encountering a domineering egg with the title “Woman and Man Boxing”.

New technology does not always mean going back through history to make advancements in video. Sometimes technological improvements allow for new developments to occur within a genre. Cell phones and other small devices equipped with video cameras have made the camera easily accessible to the documentary filmmaker. Vahid Farzaneh, Silvio Kohs and Justin Lincoln are three such filmmakers who employ their cell phone cameras to document their everyday lives.

Over the past several years artists have not only begun employing mobile devices to make new video art, but have utilized the new technology as the source of inspiration for the art piece. Michael Takeo Magruder's video, “Re-collection” pixilates an image of a landscape with a dark form coming closer to the viewer only to disappear once it is recognizable. Anthony Rousseau uses a webcam's sputtering images to enhance the fluttering movements of a child boxing, an effect that could not have been achieved through the use of a regular camera.

Filmmakers have also found traditional cinematic genres such as the narrative genre an area ripe to the development of new approaches with the use of mobile devices. Patryk Rebisz's narrative short, “Between You and Me” employs traditional narrative format with real life stop-motion animation to reveal how a digital camera can bring two strangers together. Lisa Vinebaum also employs a narrative dialogue but with imagery from a cell phone video camera of airplanes flying to address the other side of terrorism, a suicide bomber's thoughts.

Leo Earle's two shorts, “Please Release Me” and “On Hold” take the focus away from the owner of the cell phone and even from what the phone's camera can capture to place the focus on the cell phone itself, thus, anthropomorphizing the cell phone into a person with feelings of desire and frustration.

Within all of the shorts selected for this year's Mobile Exposure Festival is the common thread of filmmakers and artists exploring and pushing the boundaries of what defines cinematic genres and video art.

-Stephanie Martz
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