I, You, We: Video Sculpture

a man stands in front of 3 small computer screens show the artwork I, You, We, by Lincoln Schatz, the screens are framed in frosted in plexiglas with a small camera pointing from a hole in the center
I, You, We

I, You, We: Video Sculpture, 2007


 I, You, We is a video sculpture that observes its surroundings through a single camera and shares those recorded memories among three screens. Videos are selected, mixed and processed through a series of random chance operations and algorithms. As a result, each screen reconstructs what is seen in front of the camera over the course of years through its own set of rules and behaviors. Because of this, each screen creates three individual, but related, sets of memories that are shared with the viewer. These files are recorded over the span of the artwork’s life.

I, You, We asks the viewer to consider what happens when different records of the same event exist. How do we understand these slippages between the recordings and what was experienced? I, You, We presents both real time and historical video. This results in a compression of time, merging memories and complicating what we seem to remember seeing.

A Video Sculpture of Daily Life

I, You, We (Catharine Clark Gallery)

To begin, power is provided to a computer, a set of hard drives, an HD or SD video camera and three screens. From there, custom designed software, created by Lincoln Schatz begins a series of operations that both record and play video files simultaneously. Depending on the location and activity around the artwork, there is the possibility of it recording thousands of files a day. However, not all of these files remain past twenty-four hours. As time goes on, the computer begins to randomly remove files from that days database. Like our own memories, creating gaps in time and narrative.

Each of the three screens is pulling files from databases of video saved at the end of each day that the artwork is turned on.