They said that when I was born I looked just like my mother

© 2000 ISAST LEONARDO, Vol. 33, No. 1, pp. 17–19, 2000 17 ARTISTS’ STATEMENTS THEY SAID THAT WHEN I WAS BORN I LOOKED JUST LIKE MY MOTHER Mike McMillin, 1704 E. 4th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90033, U.S.A. E-mail: . Received 29 January 1999. Accepted for publication by George Gessert. Constructs of family and history are confined within perceptions of memory. Family is often limited to only a few generations, and history is generally seen as only recorded or recordable events. But the use of family and history need not be restricted—their application to other, more unconventional definitions can lead to an expanded understanding of ourselves and our histories . They said that when I was born I looked just like my mother is an installation that deals with these ideas and the application of the terms “family” and “history ” to evolutionary processes. Comprised of film, video and digital prints, this piece divides perceptions of history into four models: physical, actual , fictional and personal. All models are directed to family. Physical Using three 16-mm film projectors, this piece illustrates three specific physical motions that are unique to humans and some non-human primates (Fig. 1). These three motions together form part of what is called brachiation anatomy, a method of hand-over-hand suspensory locomotion shared by the great apes (chimps, gorillas and orangutans ), the lesser apes (gibbons, siamangs ) and humans. On the wall of the installation, in opposite corners of the room, hang two “drawings.” Each is 6 ft square with text concentrated in their centers. These digitally generated pieces appear to be nearly identical, yet are nearly conceptually polarized from one another: they comprise the actual and fictional portions of the four-part model. Actual This piece is a complete listing of the human mitochondrial genome. The inheritance of mitochondrial DNA is maternal , giving it unique importance in the development of molecular-based genealogies . Fictional This piece is also a genealogy, utilizing the Old and New Testaments as sources. The genealogy begins with Adam and is constructed only of names and the words “and” and “begat”; it becomes confusing and unreadable before the end of the first line. Personal The video projection shows my hand writing a journal entry, slowly, one line at a time, to emphasize the process. The entry is about my childhood memories of my mother telling me stories about her family history. The writing of the text is left general and vague, allowing for multiple readings. The story is presented as being genuinely about family history, when in fact it is an allegory about human origins. The last lines of the text are the most important : “We define ourselves through our histories. We are our histories.” This statement about the importance of history unites the four parts of the installation into one comprehensive piece: the realization of how much of ourselves is based within the past. STORY TELLING IN VIRTUAL REALITY Hisham Bizri, Electronic Visualization Laboratory, University of Illinois at Chicago (M/C 154), 851 S. Morgan St., Room 1120, Chicago, IL 60607, U.S.A. E-mail: . Website: . Received 31 October 1997. Accepted for publication by Roger F. Malina. I have been working as a filmmaker since 1986. As a student of Raul Ruiz at Harvard University, I was introduced to Zbigniew Rybczynski’s HDTV (highdefinition television) works, which fuse optical images with virtual environments . Such works helped shape my view that the use of computer technology in the service of cinematic art is an historical and artistic advance analogous to the advent of sound and color in cinema. I see the computer as a tool to build upon the achievements of cinema’s pioneers, in particular Murnau, Dreyer, Bresson and Sokurov. I set out to realize my vision of this historical progression in the context of Fig. 1. Mike McMillin, They said that when I was born I looked just like my mother, installation including film, video and digital prints. The images shown here were shot on video and transferred to 16-mm film: (left) increased medial flexion, (center) 360° rotation of the arm at the shoulder, and (right) 180° extension of the arm at the elbow. (© Mike McMillin...