7 VIDEO INSTALLATIONS TIME
11 Morse, Margaret. “Video Installation Art” p. 158 - 166. 12 Ibid., p 157. 13 Ibid., p. 154.
TIME
*Aura is a
According to Morse, video installations have multiple dimensions of time. They unfold over time through 1)how long they are installed for 2) the timeline of the media playing 3) the time needed for the visitor to complete her or his chosen path while inspecting the installation and 4) the time of reflection which happens inside the visitor from the experience. Video installations are marked by the present here and now, not only in a spatial sense but also concerning the point experienced on the timeline inside the media. A video installation has the ability to explore the past, present, and future all within the present space and time11; additionally the visitor is free to come and go as they please, entering and exiting freely the timeline of the video installation. Because of this, video installations are able to introduce fictions and manipulations of the present here and now.12
She claims that since many video installations are temporal, this fleeting existence cannot be separated from the subject, time and place of its creation. Due to such a nature, they maintain their aura* and people are enticed to come and experience it firsthand. A video installation is more than media and a created space; it is an experience inside a particular time and space. Such experiences are unique for every visitor and cannot be documented fully. The three dimensional experience can be filmed, photographed or written about, but none do it proper justice like a personal experience. Because of the site specific, temporal and experience based characteristics of video installations resulting in difficulties of documentation, they cannot be commodified like say a painting, which can be replicated, reprinted and sold as a souvenir 13. *A concept by Walter Benjamin, which describes the Aura as the essence of an artwork, which is lost through reproduction. See:“The Work of Art in the Age of Industry”by Walter Benjamin