Mary+Lucier

By Julianne Barto

Mary Lucier (1944- )

Works: //The Plains of Sweet Regret//, 2008 [1] This installation, which is presented over five video channels, is about the imagined American West. Its questions the cherished western identity and forces the viewer to reimagine the West as a lonely nothingness.



//Ohio at Giverny//: Memory of Light 1983 [2] Inspired by Claude Monet’s impressionism, Lucier’s 19-minute video begins at her home in Ohio then travels to Monet’s France. The film brings the countryside of both nations together in order to explore light within them. The piece is largely about memory (it is inspired by the artist’s grandparents), but how our memory creates an artistic representation of time by exploring the interaction between reflection and reality. The video is displayed on seven video screens. [3]

//Dawn Burn,// 1975/1933 [4]

This installation contains seven video channels of a sunrise. As the sun raises the light from the sphere “burns” the camera creating an abstracted white light. Each video is of the same image however from let to right he image is enlarged. Conceptually the worked is centered on how intersection of nature and technology.

//Approach// Lucier is consistently interested in nature. She approaches this subject in a variety of ways. However consistently she always uses multiple channels of video. These multiple channels force the viewer to almost “put the pieces together.” For example in //The Plains of Sweet Regret// how do five videos and multiple wooden chairs function as part of the same piece? The answer is not always clear and Lucier’s ambiguity allows for each viewer to take away something different. What is undisputable is the artist’s connection to nature. Her ability to portray these very real forms of the natural on to a screen is very impressive. I think the multiple video feeds help establish this. The reposition and various sight lines allow for an interaction that would be unobtainable on one video screen. She also uses the multiple screens as form of reflection, which is an intriguing technique. This technique uses the screen as both a viewer in a naturalistic element and to create an aesthetic value. The imagines bounce off each other in a way that points to the technology of the piece but something aesthetic as well. Her approach is minimal, multiple videos of repeated naturalistic imagines. Yet she is able to address larger conceptions that address the growth technology the ideals of the American West, the ambiguous notions of reality and memory.

I would like to experiment with Luicer’s multiple video screens, specifically her use of reflection. I am also intrigued by her subject matter. The idea of capturing nature on video and somehow making it come alive is very intriguing. Luicer challenges us as viewers to see if we can feel the same emotions of watching an actual sunrise as we watch one on film. Is it possible for video to replace reality?

[1] http://www.belmarlab.org/marylucier.php [2] http://www.eai.org/title.htm?id=4299 [3] http://www.bampfa.berkeley.edu/exhibition/95 [4] http://www.sfmoma.org/explore/collection/artwork/9092