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Early Conceptual Videos

Takahiko iimura

1977 00:31:00 JapanEnglishB&WMono4:3Video
Tags:
Asian-American, Video History, Conceptual Art

Description

A collection of early conceptually oriented videos which were produced in Tokyo in the early 1970s using words along with images, except for the first two flicker-effect pieces: A Chair (1970) and Blinking (1970). 

Time Tunnel (1971) is an attempt at time travel in a very conceptual sense. 

Man and Woman (1971) shows full body images of a naked man and woman shot from above without movement.  They are shown alone as well as together, one over (or under) the other, symbolizing words at the same time as their positions. 

Visual Logic (and Illogic) (1977) shows visual logic (and illogic) of signs combining with limited movements of camera for panning and zooming.

These early videos signify some of the first experiments in "conceptual video" that few other video artists were attempting at the time.  Furthermore, this is an important collection to compare to later developments in the art of iimura's video.

Note: Most of the works are excerpted.

About Takahiko iimura

A pioneering figure in the New York and Japanese film and video undergounds, Taka iimura has had a tremendous impact upon the development of experimental cinema in both the U.S. and Japan. iimura's work in video has concentrated on deconstructing the language of video, especially video's power to obscure the author of the image, through the audience's immediate acceptance of what is shown on screen as true. iimura establishes a relation between the self-reflexive nature of language and the simultaneous feedback characteristic of video, exploiting this relation to investigate the shifting position of video's subject (who is behind the camera) and object (who is in front of the camera). Through his videos, which read like elaborate semiotic riddles, iimura has educated audiences to the structure of video in a way that has profoundly changed the way the medium is viewed.

He is a widely established international artist, having had numerous solo exhibitions in major museums such as the Musem of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum, Anthology Film Archives, Centre Georges Pompidou, the National Gallery Jeu de Paume, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Reina Sofia National Museum, and the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, in addition to artist residencies at the German Academy of Arts and Bellagio Rockefeller Foundation Study Center.

Recently he has been involved in using computers, publishing more than 20 DVDs/CD-ROMs, and writing several books on film, video, and multimedia, including a book published in English, "The Collected Writings of Takahiko iimura".

"I am concerned with the whole system of video, not just what you see on the screen, but including the camera, monitor, the whole system."
—Takahiko iimura