The Prophet Ezekiel’s ministry occurred during a difficult time. Despair and conflict was the (dis)order of the day. In the midst of this situation, God called Ezekiel to restore all humankind’s hope for a just and lasting peace for all people. His story echoes for us today as the world seems to be in no better condition. Ezekiel’s visions included great fires and torrents of water. In my proposed multimedia installation, the centerpiece is a side by side video of fire and water being projected in a corner of the room echoing Ezekiel’s visions.
The primary intent of the installation, as in much of my other work, is to highlight the polarization of our current discourse both politically and socially. Ideally democratic discourse should create an atmosphere of discussion (from the Latin discutere, “to investigate”). Unfortunately the current discourse tends to debate one another (from the Latin de battuere, “to beat down”). This polarization led me to the imagery of fire and water as in Ezekiel’s visions.
One video contains images of water mirrored onto each other to form symmetry flowing into a center. The other video uses the same mirroring of videos of fire. The mirroring of the images creates an hypnotic abstract symmetry.
Around the room are four painted tubes, two with abstracted images of water and two with fire. The tubes are painted cardboard tubes used in construction to create concrete pillars. Inside each tube is a loudspeaker.
Sounds of burning fire and rushing water intermittently fade in and out from the tubes. The mixing of the two similar sounds creates a sonic symmetry drifting from water sounds to sounds of fire, from one tube to another. By mixing the sounds, they at times become indistinguishable from each other. In the end, to the listener, the sounds of water and fire are not so dissimilar.
A computer is used to store and playback the two videos on the two projectors mounted in a corner 90 degrees apart. The computer is also attached to each speaker located in each tube. The computer controls which sound comes from each tube.
Art With Held --- David Held 