Analog Hell: Projection Performances by Bruce McClure

Per our class discussions relating to the emergence of video art in the seventies, I made it out to the REDCAT Theatre last Tuesday night to check out the "Projection Performances" by New York artist Bruce McClure.  Using three 16mm film projectors as his medium, McClure's "projection performance" is thus created by his ability to manipulate and distort the hollow images projected onto a black screen.  McClure's performance Tuesday night was appropriately titled "Locative Enigma - Frameshape of Hard Mettles - A Personal Problem."
A personal problem indeed: MY personal problem.   The performance began without any visual gimmickry: the dimming of the house lights were followed by the projection of two, flickering white squares as well as a looped audio track of blaring (so blaring in fact that ear plugs were handed out to each audience member), repetitive, mechanical sounding thuds.   THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD (this 'beat' was continuous throughout the performance).  After my first three minutes of enduring this audio/visual assault on the senses I began to grow increasingly impatient.  At what point does McClure's artistry reveal itself?  Well, I can't answer that because I got up and walked out after about twenty five minutes.  I can certainly make the claim that my nerves were too fragile to endure another moment of what I would undoubtedly refer to as analog brutality.  What really concerns me more isn't necessarily my distaste for McClure's seizure invoking art practice, but instead, the immediacy that this distaste manifested itself.  I would imagine that McClure's entire performance lasted roughly ninety minutes, and of that ninety minutes I could only bear about twenty five before I could no longer resist the urge to exit the theatre and flee.  If McClure's intention was to test the limits of his audiences' endurance, I definitely failed this test...but I know I wasn't the only one.   As you can see in the video footage I shot of McClure's performance below, a fellow deserter is caught in the act.