Urban Episodes, 1980
Single-channel video, colour, sound, 8:50 minutes
Instrumentation by Josef Krames, Woody Vasulka and Bruce Hamilton
Courtesy of the Artist and BERG Contemporary
Urban Episodes forms part of Steina’s Machine Vision series, begun in 1975, in which the camera is treated as an optical and mechanical instrument. For these six short works, filmed in Minneapolis, Steina constructed a motorised apparatus in which a platform mounted on a turntable carried the camera and optical elements at opposite ends. During recording, the assembly rotated horizontally while the camera simultaneously moved vertically and laterally, producing compound motion across multiple axes.
Each episode employs a distinct optical configuration, producing varying refractions, reflections, and rotations of the urban landscape. The assembly generates simultaneous views of the space it revolves through and the images deflected by its mirrors and lenses, presenting both at once within the frame. Taken together, the six episodes constitute a systematic survey of the angles and orientations through which a camera can break urban space into its component parts.