Respons to Video and Intermedia

In his remarks, Foster is not describing Breder’s work, but rather seeks to explain the questions that video, specifically Breder’s video, has given him. One of the first questions Foster seems to be focused on intermedia and what makes something intermedia. He indirectly poses the idea that many seem to merely consider that “intermedia pieces ‘break down traditional art boundaries’”. I think what he means by this is that oftentimes, people consider a work an “intermedia piece” when it combines two forms of art, however, this is not what intermedia means. He goes on to explain that, “it (intermedia), is more a question of finding a means of motorizing ideas and expectations in different areas of activities”. What I think he means by this is that the piece itself should stimulate the viewer’s thoughts in such a way that is much greater than a non-intermedia piece.

I thoroughly enjoyed Foster’s comparison of intermedia to being political. It makes sense, quite simply, seeing that political affairs can bring about the most critical feelings in even the most quite person. Such can art do the same when it is serving intermedia purposes. This, I think, is due to the fact that intermedia art is, as Foster stated, “‘facilitates’ or ‘enables’ intellectual, critical, and aesthetic values.” This is why Foster places so much emphasis on video, because, without going into detail, it compels and it has all of these different characteristics that make it so easy to connect with the viewer. This connection between the work and the viewer is so inherently important to the concept of intermedia because “intermedia”, according to Foster, “might closely parallel how we would go about describing or evaluating a human being”. Because intermedia so closely parallels to the evaluation of a human being, the viewer becomes enabled by the piece, causing the viewer to feel, especially with video, strongly about the subject and raise criticisms, questions, or actions about the piece. As Foster points out, “video cannot avoid being political, it cannot avoid being confronting problem areas, and it cannot avoid being socially relevant,” but to me, this is what defines intermedia, to be a medium that challenges the viewer. Without this challenging the viewer, what purpose does the piece have, other than pleasure?

Here is my ubuweb video: http://www.ubu.com/film/marker_junkopia.html

It was created by Chris Marker, John Chapman, and Frank Simeone in 1981 and is titled "Junkopia". I found this piece interesting because it is essentially video artists creating their piece using the pieces of sculpture artists. Another thing that makes this video interesting is that the sculpture artists remain anonymous, they create their sculptures with items from the sea and remain anonymous. This anonymity ties in well with the sounds that follow the video. These sounds can be said to be creepy, but they bring the viewer deeper into the anonymity, a mother level deeper into the unknown.