March 28 – April 25, 2008
911 Media Arts welcomed another renowned media artist to its gallery with Cornish College of the Arts video professor Robert Campbell’s original video installation yellow. Yellow, curated by Misha Neininger, addressed perhaps the two greatest issues of our time—environmental degradation and information exchange—through a unique technique of projecting video onto cast plaster and glass.
“My intention is to create a mind stain,” Campbell said of the work. The video projections served as a form of information exchange that tried to mimic or substitute for the overabundance of chemical inputs we receive through cosmetics, food, and other common products. At its core, yellow looked into the deep relationship between information and chemicals, and attempted to leave a chemical imprint on the minds of viewers.
Throughout March, Campbell also showed his related single-channel collaborative work, Delta of C16H22O4 (with music by composer Jarrad Powell) at Cornish College of the Arts as part of the 2008 Art Department faculty exhibition.
Campbell is a professor in the Fine Art Department at Cornish College of the Arts, and has produced work for over a decade dealing with themes of environmental loss and change in an over-crowded world. In 2006 he collaborated with Yuki Nakamura to create Floating Plaster/City Motion, a multi-media installation at 911 Media Arts Center using video and cast sculpture that incorporated multiple video projectors and programmable matrix switchers.
Film Screenings
As part of its presentation of the work of Robert Campbell, 911 Media Arts Center screened five of the artist’s acclaimed films on Friday March 28th and another two on Friday April 25th. The screenings were a part of Upgrade! Seattle, 911’s monthly gathering of new media artists every last Friday of the month.
Friday March 28th
Leicht und zart (2004) is an animated piece based on the life of 19th century composer Robert Schumann. Set to Schumann’s deeply moving music, the piece explores the themes of loss, madness, sexuality, and death that characterized the final days of the composer’s life.
Eidolon (2004) sets animation to an evocative electro-acoustic score by composer Jarrad Powell to create a beautiful, melancholy “image poem.” Tilt (2005) is another animated collaboration with composer Powell, using a score originally created for a 2002 dance piece by choreographer Mary Sheldon Scott.
A Clear Day and No Memories (2002) and Redress (2005) are the first and third in a three-part series of video dance works stemming from a collaborative effort with the Maureen Whiting Dance Company. A Clear Day and No Memories weaves together dance and architecture, using the striking backdrop of Fort Warden in Port Townsend, WA. Created during a Centrum residency, the film uses the music of celebrated local composers Eyvind Kang and David Stanford. In Redress, Campbell and Whiting continue their cinematic meditation focusing on three doorways, buckets, and a brilliant red dress.
