selected works from 1985-2009
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Sometimes I like a happy ending; sometimes I like a sad ending (2009) random objects random thoughts (2009) Signs of Life: an intimate portrait of someone I don't know (2008) Le stade du Miroir (2003) you are on my mind (2003) The Trouble with Translation (2003) Family Album (2002) between two points (2001) Doing Time (2000) Staging Memory (2000) I should have, I could have, I would have... ...if only (1998) I am ... (1998) The Veiled Room (1998) Projections for the Unseeing (1997) A Portable Viewing Station for Anxious Travelers (1994) In Memoriam Forgetting and Remembering Fragments of History (1993) Measure of the Man (1992) Fragments for a Story (1991) Search for Definition (1991) Isn't your/my mother beautiful? (1990) Neon for j.e. atkinson (1990) My lips are sealed (1989) Contradictions and Possibilities (1988) In the room (1987) Hide and Seek (1985) Back to Back (1985) |
The Trouble with Translation, 2003
video installation, 2 T.V monitors on pedestals 5’ high, 2 video projections @ 8’ “ The translator is always caught up in a more knotted, smudgy double-move. He or she has to construct meaning first in the source language in terms of its texture, feel, mood. Then he or she has to tailor this semantic construct a second time round in the language into which it is put. Between the constructions there is a lack of fit, a gap….” Sarat Maharaj, p. 72, catalogue for Documenta XI Language is the central metaphor for the themes of dislocation, immigration, identity in the video installation, The Trouble with Translation. There is a non-sync that hits us particularly with jokes in a foreign language. We’re not in on them. We haven’t a clue as to what’s going on. The gales of laughter and guffaws intensify the awareness of being left out. This constitutes one facet of translation, the literal translation of words that is explored in The Trouble with Translation. Language as the basis for the formation of thought, memory, consciousness, identity and as a metaphor for communication, miscommunication is another aspect of the translation problem that we experience in the video installation. Two video monitors with their glass screens facing each other are placed on pedestals at eye level, in the middle of the gallery space. The position of the monitors are like 2 people engaged in conversation. The viewer stands between the monitors, looking back and forth at them like a spectator at a tennis match. Behind the T.V. monitors are large video projections on the wall. The same sequence of images appear on both the television monitors and the video projections. Although the sequences are on a loop and repeated, they are out of sync and appear at different times on both monitors and video projections. The viewer experiences only fragmentary information that must be deciphered to construct meaning which at best will be incomplete. The narratives in The Trouble with Translation are multi-vocal, multi-lingual and non-linear sequences of image and text . They include my mother reading poetry in Hungarian written by her father about my birth and me as a child, and me reading a letter from my maternal grandmother about her journey by ship to Canada. The letter is an awkward translation from Hungarian to English by my mother for me since I cannot read or speak Hungarian. In another sequence, Ron is telling a joke in Yiddish about 2 hens boasting about whose eggs are worth more. His translation in English is hampered by whipping cream sprayed in his face as he tries to speak. As he is speaking, a text runs across the bottom of the screen like sub-titles in a foreign film. The text reads” The Fine Art of Conversation: Paying for immigrants to learn proper tonality and the nuance of English improves work morale and gives newcomers a chance to bond with other employees in a positive learning environment ” Other words appear letter by letter as a hand writes “What language do you dream in? What language do you swear in? They say people always count in their mother tongue. That’s how you can discover spies….they forget and count in their mother tongue…anyway, that’s what I was told.” Like Family Album, the video installation, The Trouble with Translation consists of a series of disconnected images and text that collage irony, personal narrative cultural and historical references. Both works present viewers with immersive situations where their physical and psychological experience is an integral component to activating and completing the piece. |