Set Apart
Set Apart is a three-channel video installation consisting of three digital projectors placed side by side projecting onto a wall. The configuration implies a panoramic view. Set Apart uses three cameras mounted together with arithmetic precision to insure that the three-video channels can create either a unified or fragmented scene. The complex editing process of three channels makes it possible to create the resistance and dissonance between the three perspectives, enabling the portrayal of the character's psychological fragmentation. As the story continues, the viewer becomes aware of the fracturing of the environment - a breakdown of the character and her reality into three different perspectives. The use of three channels of video creates the illusion of a space that deconstructs as the three screens are no longer synchronized in time and space yet remain related in content. In a subsequent scene, the character meanders along the beach. The focal plane of the three lenses' is short so that, when far away, the woman appears in triplicate. Yet, as she makes her way closer to the three cameras, she begins to converge into a focused being. When she steps into the exact focal plane of the three lenses, her parts snap into place. No longer fragmented, she examines the lens as if looking at her whole self in a mirror. She has sought and found her own center.

Through the three frames' union and separation, we are able to experience the character's thoughts expanding and recanting; her attention spread out into thousands of pieces. Eventually each scene comes back into focus and there is always relief. In the closing scene however, she is betrayed by the medium, laid out before us her brain unable to bring the three channels of video together into her stereographic image. Instead, the three frames move independently of each other, in rare moments and only through editing do her gestures align.

MariannaMedia will design multi-channel video works like this one for store displays, window designs and trade shows.

Funded by: Seattle Arts Commission, Cornish College of the Arts and
911 Media Arts Center