The Smoke Screen (2014) interviews are with Civil War re-enactors who participated at the 150th Commemoration battles of the Civil War at Gettysburg, PA. For me, the idea of performance and public space, whether rehearsed, implied or actual, sits somewhere between fact/fiction, acting/lived experience, history/present day, time and space. Smoke Screen, is a series of 7 short interviews made at Gettysburg, PA in 2013. I am interested people who re-enact the life/lives and times of the Civil War, and those that play specific roles at historical sites / tourist attractions. This research stems from my interest in performance as everyday life and the role that performance plays in tourism and 'living history' events in the US. Predominantly Anglo Americans, the interviews include their reasons for re-enacting and how their performances might impact the current and future generations and how their roles might be received by African American people today. To see Derek's interview, press the following link.
Derek Pugh: Duration: 3 minutes and 21 seconds
Derek Pugh is a re-enactor who is from Missisippi and re-enacts the battles of the Civil War. He loves to re-enact and does this to remind future generations not to forget history, to see how people lived in that time and that the battles for States rights and the abolishment of slavery was fought 'brother against brother' in that war. Derek is one of the 7 re-enactors I have interviewed for this project.
Tourist, Walk on by, Backlash and You Bawdy Beauty works.
Three videos about happenstance. Tourist is about being involved in a mugging on the subway, Walk on by is about Bystander apathy and You Bawdy Beauty is about my first time getting dressed up for Halloween and walking into the wrong party. After staying for half and hour I went home and made this video.
Statements:
Tourist and Walk on by are happenstance events and are statements on a systems breakdown from two different perspectives.
Tourist; Duration: 3 minutes 31 seconds
I was making a tourist video to send home to Australia to show my family some part of my new life. I was the first time I had held a video camera in Chicago. Tourist is a real event that happened one Sunday afternoon on the 'el' in Chicago.
Walk on by; Duration: 37 seconds
The theme explored in Walk on By is bystander apathy. Walk on by is an event I witnessed at 3am one Sunday morning in Chicago where I happened upon a homeless lady sleeping in an ATM foyer.
You bawdy beauty parts 1-4; Duration: 2 minutes 52 seconds
You bawdy beauty is a performative exploration of what happens when you go to your first Halloween party and go to the wrong one? Do you come home feeling like 'Magenta' from The Rocky Horror Picture show and do nothing? A performance using photoanimation which speaks to impersonation, silent film, abstraction and experimentation.
Backlash; Duration : 55 seconds
Backlash is a performance with a whip that backfires. A true sock-in-the-eye story of a whip mis-hap when you are trying to exorcise a demon but instead it comes back to bite you. Maybe this should be called 'How to give yourself a black eye?'