State of Division

Creator:

Hartney, Mick
  • This work is part of the rewind archive.

    Duration: 5m 14s

    Year: 1978

    Original formats:

    3/4" U-Matic Lo Band

    Media types:

    Video

    Type of work:

    Single Screen

    Funding source: Self

    First exhibited: 1979 LVA Distribution1980 Video Artists on Tour

    Technical details: Made with a single black and white studio camera, 2 U-Matic Lo Band recorders, a monitor and a very crude vision mixer. One tape was recorded then fed back into the mixer then mixed with live camera images and then mastered on the second Umatic, virtually without editing.

    “The basic idea behind state of division was that a videotape would be found on a bus and played by the finder. It would be found to contain the rambling statement of a character aware of himself only as a video recording. In fact the tape was an attempt to deal in a state of tranquility with the experience of period of clinical depression I had had some years before. As I was no longer affected by these feelings, I felt free to deal with them with a degree of humour. The work does seem to have hit a variety of different nerves in its audiences perhaps because of the apparently raw, confessional nature of the script.” Mick Hartney March 2008.

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