whiteonwhite:algorithmicnoir

Eve Sussman, Rufus Corporation, whiteonwhite:algorithmicnoir, 2009-2011, two-channel digital cinema installation, dimensions variable, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment, 2014.43, © 2011, Eve Sussman / Rufus Corporation

Artwork Details

Title
whiteonwhite:algorithmicnoir
Artists
Rufus Corporation
Date
2009-2011
Location
Not on view
Dimensions
dimensions variable
Copyright
© 2011, Eve Sussman / Rufus Corporation
Credit Line
Museum purchase through the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment
Mediums Description
two-channel digital cinema installation
Classifications
Subjects
  • Architecture Interior — civic — theater
Object Number
2014.43

Artwork Description

The core of the Rufus Corporation’s “expedition to unravel utopian promise” would become this digital cinema installation whiteonwhite:algorithmicnoic. It is an experimental film composed from two screens: one reflecting the “movie” and one depicting the computer program behind the movie. In making the film, the collective traveled between Moscow and the Caspian Sea, compiling a cinematic record of the landscape, environment, and architecture while filming in local cafes, apartment blocks, and industrial plants. An audio/visual library comprised of 3,000 film clips, 80 voice-overs, and 150 pieces of music forms the basis of an improvised film noir.
A non-linear narrative unfolds through the observations and surveillance of the central protagonist, Holz, who finds himself living in a dystopian futuropolis. Further provoking cinematic form, the film’s presentation is edited in real time by a custom-programmed computer that Sussman has labeled the “serendipity machine.” The artwork is driven by key words that appear on the secondary screen and delivers a changing narrative that runs indefinitely, never playing the same sequence twice. The unexpected juxtapositions of voice, image, and sound create a sense of unyielding suspense that continuously divorces the protagonist from the full course of his own narrative.


Watch This!: Revelations in Media Art, 2015

Works by this artist (2 items)

Frederic Edwin Church, Aurora Borealis, 1865, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Eleanor Blodgett, 1911.4.1
Aurora Borealis
Date1865
oil on canvas
On view
Frederic Edwin Church, Cotopaxi, 1855, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Mrs. Frank R. McCoy, 1965.12
Cotopaxi
Date1855
oil on canvas
On view

More Artworks from the Collection

William Holbrook Beard, The Runaway Match, 1877, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase, 1977.55
The Runaway Match
Date1877
oil on canvas
Not on view
John Henry Twachtman, Figure in Sunlight (Artist's Wife), ca. 1890-1900, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of John Gellatly, 1929.6.137
Figure in Sunlight (Artist’s Wife)
Dateca. 1890-1900
oil on canvas
On view
Unidentified (Italian), Saint, 19th century, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Laura Dreyfus Barney and Natalie Clifford Barney in memory of their mother, Alice Pike Barney, 1952.13.157
Saint
Artist
Unidentified (Italian)
Date19th century
oil on canvas
Not on view