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the
citizen |
an
18 part interactive quicktime CD |
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In a culture betrayed by simulations, the citizen is confounded by routine artificial representations of reality. In 1936, Salvador Dali, accusing filmmaker Joseph Cornell of stealing the film, "Rose Hobart" from his (Dali's) subconscious, knocked over the projector and stormed out of its premiere. The surrealists held that the purpose of art and cinema was to stimulate and manipulate the subconscious via an altered, misplaced and "improper" association of the elements of reality. By 2000, the surreal and transcendental experience of modern TV viewing has produced a million hallucinogenic experiences for everyone within its reach. The average adult will have seen over two million commercials by age 65. The "best" and most effective of these are surreal soundings of a product's potential within the viewer's subconscious mind. No contract is required - just tuning-in grants the license to probe. The Citizen is a piece about media manipulation, its effects and a possible strategy of self-defense. It is important understand that the surreal is in fact a "realism" of the subconscious and not the stuff of fairy tales or pure fantasy. Breton defined surrealism as pure psychic automatism. Ironically, for art fans, the value to advertisers of such automatism has grown beyond calculation. Think about this when you see a typical TARGET ad on TV (motto:"The Power to Get"). Or a Weight Watchers ad that fails to mention or picture any problem with obesity. All is expressed in the quality and grace (read: "expense") of the graphics simulations. The magic says it all. There is a reason advertisers pay on average $375,000 to produce high quality TV spots. SIMULATIONS Discussions on the topic of simulations are found in Jean Baudrillard's work, Simulacra and Simulations, (The book-simulacrum in which Neo stores his contraband in "The Matrix"). An interesting application of the Baudriliard thesis is found in the film development of Daniel Galouye's novel, The Thirteenth Floor which literally builds upon Baudrillard's (Borges') cartographers' example where the map of the thing replaces the thing itself. Although television seems to have begun innocently enough as a means of entertainment we can see it soon spawning its own audience of simulators (of itself) and hence switching roles with its public. Now it seems people will do just about anything to enjoy the affirmation appearing on TV apparently affords. Additional Notes: THE INTERFACE THE NETWORK
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