Sun room studio set-up for video shoot.
I recently assisted my long-time collaborator Gary MacLeod with a new video project, acting as videographer and editor. Gary had been commissioned by Art In Transit to create 10 eight-second videos to be broadcast on a downtown Toronto LED billboard during the 2014 summer.
The videos, part of the Sign Me Up program, are seeded amongst the regular advertisements on a billboard at the busy downtown corner of Yonge and Richmond streets. This is a great opportunity for Gary’s sign-based art to reach thousands of eyes and create unexpected dialogues.
Gary has a long history of incorporating signs and signage in his art practice, and these videos are a transformation of an evolving street intervention project.
I am obsessed with manipulating signs and editing their meanings. When I see those oh-so-present “DANGER DUE TO:†signs. I really see “ANGER ANGER DUE TO:†signs and immediately want to write in a thousand different words and reasons in that blank box space.
Gary MacLeod
Anger Due To, installation, Distillery District, 2013.
For the video project, we built a replica chain link fence with tiled sheets of A4 paper in Gary’s sun room. I videoed 20 Gary’s hand writing 20 words (he had narrowed down out of dozens). With the input of PATTISON OneStop’s Sharon Switzer, we honed the videos down to the 10 that will be shown from June 1to August 30, 2014.
Below are previews of two of the videos (I’m going to video them on the billboard this week and will post them soon):
