Tess Martin, Plain Face, video still © 2011

Andrew Binkley, Crossings, video still © 2011

Andrew Binkley: Crossing

Binkley will present a four-channel video work entitled, Crossings. His work continually acts as a way to uncover and explore our notions of time and patterns of human behavior. Through the use of an overhead perspective and layering multiple videos of the seen and unseen links between people on the streets below, ‘Crossings’ works with the themes of intersecting or sharing paths, and integrating or transforming relationships, as well as the unknown or transient connections between people through time.  Echoing those passing by e4c, Crossings offers a new insight into one’s own relationship with time and the paths around us that we continue to cross.

Barbara Robertson, Blue Field © 2011, photo by Nancy Hines

Barbara Robertson: Three Phases, Trace & Linescape

Robertson is transforming her 2D print artwork into digitally generated, abstract imagery for video. e4c will feature three of her short, non-narrative experimental animation works. She writes, “My work explores ideas related to space, mapping, motion, and light, inspired by current scientific inquiry in the fields of physics, astronomy and biology…I am beginning to explore how to embed media art in an architectural space. I imagine that people will be attracted to it in the same way they are drawn to aquariums or planetariums.” The sound scores for the works, were composed in collaboration with sound designer Johanna Melamed. The sound scores, integral to each piece, deepens and enriches their expressive range.

Learn more about all three artists on our Galleries page.

Click here to view the embedded video.

In early September, a peer-selection panel chose 16 artists/artist teams from a highly competitive pool of applicants. From creating a narrative using recycled film footage to a video about recycling, selected works represent a diverse sampling of electronic media. Projects will be presented as soon they have been adapted to meet technical requirements of the site, as early as November.

Selected Artists for e4c’s 2011-2012 Season:

Evertt Beidler — Portland, OR e4c will feature Moves Manager, a four minute experimental film by Beidler that features a custom walking machine, which integrates the human body. Beidler writes, “Generating objects and then using them in a fashion that is demonstrative of the ideals they embody allows me to explore the relationship between concept and function while asserting the importance of cathartic activities.”

Andrew Binkley — Mililani, HI Binkley will present a four-channel video work entitled, Crossings. He created this work by layering multiple videos of pedestrians, using an overhead perspective. Binkley shares, “The e4c venue is ideal form of display for this body of work, in that the videos echo the passersby along the street, offering a new insight into their own relationship with time and the crossing of paths around them.”

Betty Jo Costanzo — Seattle, WA e4c will show Topical Ointment, which Costanzo describes as a short, video poem. The layering of images of swimming-pool-blue water and text written on slips of paper creates a calm, contemplative video. Costanzo writes, “I work in layers. Each layer tells me where to go next. Like memory, each layer has a place, but only for an instant.”

Carol dePelecyn — Seattle, WA dePelecyn’s first video work entitled, Sort will be presented on e4c. This video was created with the intent to take the behind-the-scenes act of recycling to the public. dePelecyn writes, Sort reveals the reality of workers employed to sort our garbage already sorted before arriving at the recycling center.”  The mesmerizing flow of random materials is punctuated with hands combing through waste.

Salise Hughes — Seattle, WA Hughes will create a new short work, which utilizes the four-channel opportunity of e4c. She intends to reference the film Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans, by F. W. Murnau by manipulating recycled film footage. Hughes notes, “I would like to make a video work…that says something about the cyclical nature or ‘ebb and flow’ of relationships and conflicts.”

Bradley Hyppa — San Francisco, CA e4c will present three experimental motion graphic videos by Hyppa that show dynamic prisms of color that move throughout abstracted spaces. He states he wants to “… allow the viewer to consider alternative narratives about space communicated by the impressions afforded from a distribution of sensation sequenced by the experience of color and form.

Ellen Lake — Oakland, CA e4c will show a collaborative project by Ellen Lake and Chris Green entitled, Seaworthy. This video is part of a series about urban bodies of water, later animated with people swimming, floating inner tubes and other recreational activities that may not be possible in industrial areas, much like the ports in the Oakland and Seattle areas.

Ronald Lambert — Nashville, TN Lambert has proposed a new site-specific work for e4c, similar to his past work City Order and Land Slices. He is interested in utilizing the imagery of the city and the grids of steel and concrete found in an urban area, as well has short bursts of landscape imagery. He is interested in the competing images of cities and landscapes.

Michael Lasater — South Bend, IN e4c will present Lasater’s Crossing, Berlin 1927. This single channel video presents multiple images of the same historic footage of a woman crossing the street in Berlin in 1927. Crossing, Berlin 1927 references memory and the notion of film as a cubist medium.

George Lee — Seattle, WA Lee will show his light-hearted, stop-motion animation of woodcut figurines entitled, When Wooden Sheep and Penguins Dance on e4c. These simple figures dance on a cupboard and form an animal friendship over a piece of hay.

Tess Martin — Seattle, WA 4Culture is pleased to welcome back Tess Martin to e4c. This season, we will feature Martin’s latest film, Plain Face. This stop-frame animation is created using back-lit paint and plastic cut-out materials. The story told is that of the arrival of an outsider to a fantastical land where she is met with prejudice, violence and ultimately, love.

Nichole Rathburn — Seattle, WA Alongside Rathburn’s existing work entitled, 1000 Ports, a collection of animations of slow-moving eyes, e4c will feature her new work, which will include faster-moving animations of arms and legs.  The subtle movement of body parts is both humorous and eerie.

Barbara Robertson — Seattle, WA Robertson is transforming her well-respected, 2D print artwork into digitally generated, abstract imagery for video. e4c will feature three of her short, non-narrative experimental animation works. She writes, “I am beginning to explore how to embed media art in an architectural space. I imagine that people will be attracted to it in the same way they are drawn to aquariums or planetariums.”

C. Andrew Rohrmann — Seattle, WA e4c will present Undone, Rohrmann’s experiment in ambient cinema. His macro video is paired with text, to form an abstract, yet somewhat narrative, tale of the universe. Colorful bursts of swirling liquids look like living cells, or possibly the solar system.

Stephen Sewell — Seattle, WA Sewell will show Shuffling a deck of cards with one hand and Attempting to pull a rug out from under myself, two short videos that depict the artist engaging in improbable actions. He writes, “Both videos are explorations of subversion and how its intentions are linked to self-destruction and failure.”

Rodrigo Valenzuela — Seattle, WA e4c will feature Valenzuela’s cinematic One Day and Bird Noise. Footage of dogs playing and birds in flight are abstracted by pace, desaturation, layering and perspective. Valenzuela shares, “I present narrative models that affect the viewer’s sense of logic and reality, often using animals and landscapes as allegories for human activities.”

This year’s panelists included Lisa Dixon, Program Director for the Alliance for Pioneer Square; Visual artist, Paul McKee; and filmmaker, Kaie Wise of Renton. Learn more about e4c, where to see it and how you too can apply to present video.

A Moment’s Reverie and Gaijin/The Foreigner
premiering November 5, 2009

In conjunction with First Thursday, we are psyched to premiere the first new additions to the e4c lineup for the 09/10 season. Seattle-based animator Tess Martin will present two works adapted for the electronic gallery:

A Moment’s Reverie, a back-lit paper cut-out animation, which is a journey through a character’s thoughts and memories, triggered by the letters in her book. These same letters burn up in a tea cup, get shot, and hover in the sky, spelling out her most hidden desires.

Gaijin/The Foreigner, a piece using packaging from junk mail found in Japan in a clever cut-out animation following a chameleon-like character through a journey of change.

Tess Martin, A Moments Reverie (Still), Video Animation, photo by the artist