TeleVISIONS (October/November 1975)

TeleVISIONS/8 “But mommy, I'm still in the TV!” By Victoria Costello A story told by a librarian in our basic workshop: “We set up a live video playback system in a suburban shopping center mall. A crowd gathered around us, with people straining to see themselves on the monitor. “A mother approached, small son in hand. He looked startled to see his own image appear. Ti-e mother started to walk away, but the little boy refused to move on. He continued to stare at the monitor, and when his mother pulled at him to leave, he began to cry, ‘but mommy, I'm still in the TV.” Mary Casamatsu, excerpt from a video student's diary: “Since there were several new members in the group, the first activity of the evening was to introduce ourselves. Then, as a review and further introduction to the class and its objectives, we watched the playback of a tape made the week before with some of the people in the group introducing themselves on video. “They introduced their bodies—to me one of the most difficult types of introductions I could conceive of, on or off camera— Photo: Ann Eugenia Volkes Beyond boring: process by — TP Videospace Troupe By Susan Milano from an interview with Victoria Costello When I first got into video I would very often meet other video people who were doing what they called “real time’ tapes which often meant you would sit for an hour and watch while somebody took a bath. If you happen to be the one taking the bath, it’s fabulous, you spend a nice long hour doing every little thing you do. But as an observer, my only reaction was, so what? This is not really much different than home movies, yet at the same time this was my definition of process video. It generally meant something that was boring unless you were in it. In contrast, what the TP deals with is the setting up of a closed circuit video environment so that the workshop or show actually is the process of the people’s involvement in it. The process is not the Women in process At the Women’s Interart Center, I taught an all women's workshop for the first time. My feeling then was, why an all women’s learning situation? | didn't really see the validity of it. But since then I’ve realized that there is a need for it. In previous experiences where I had taught in mixed groups, this strange thing would happen between the men and women about who was going to carry heavy equipment and do the more technical tasks. The inevitable result was that the men did most of them. The guys would come on with this comraderie towards the equipment as if it is just understood that men know how to make these things work, whereas women never would get that support to deal with the technical stuff. I found that in an all women’s group there is the space for that kind of support to develop among the women. A generally closer rapport develops because we are overcoming some basic blocks together, as well as learning video. audience sitting back watching someone else’s experience, but rather their own experience. The best way to describe the kinds of techniques used in a TP workshop would be for me to relate my first experience with one led by Shirley and Wendy Clarke. It was a marathon-weekend exposure to the “fundamentals of video,” We split into two groups. Each group goes into its own space with a portapac. In group A each individual makes a one minute tape of themselves sympathizing, empathizing, by verbalizing and moving. In group B each individual makes a one minute tape of themselves complaining about something. We playback both tapes simultaneously on two monitors. This was usually really entertaining. = the second exercise, each group selects a set of objects and makes a five minute tape about them. Our group used masks for this tape. In the third exercise, each group chooses a destination and takes a portapac and a battery-operated monitor. Once in the new environment the group must do video playback there using the tape of objects, a tape of the new environment, and _ live playback of people in this new environment. Our group ended up at 2 a.m. on the stage of Town Hall doing a video intermission show. It was really crazy. ; For the fourth exercise, each group takes a portapak and sets out to record the sunrising any way they choose to represent it. Finally, the entire group reconvenes for breakfast and a final marathon viewing of everything shot during the workshop, played back simultaneously. 1 came away from this workshop with a whole new way of looking at video. I was particularly turned on to the potential of television for connecting up of separate spaces and how this ‘‘satellite’’ concept can be explored in a closed circuit video environment. I try to use similar kinds of exercises in my own workshops. The basic principle is one of learning video through active involvement with it, on many levels. beginning with whatever piece of anatomy they wanted to talk about and continuing as long as they had something to say, with the camera zooming in on the appropriate spots. Those of us who were new to the class were invited to try this exercise, but being a cowardly lot, we escaped scrutiny with mumblings of ‘‘maybe next week.” As I review the experience, I-can assign a positive feeling to the evening, it was fun. But, at least in the beginning, it was one of the scariest things I'd ever put my ego through. While I felt comfortable with the equipment we were using—two studio cameras with attendant cables, lights, and SEG—I had an irrational and long-standing fear of being on camera. I viewed the experience at first as something of a challenge I would have to meet, a fear I would have to conquer, or at best something I would just get used to.” Wonder mixed with terror is the reaction to seeing oneself in video. Children are usually more honest than adults in their response to it. Once they have accepted the new toy, they demand to keep playing with it until they have seen themselves make every face and every body contortion they can possibly dream of acting out. We adults meanwhile will most often self-consciously do our best to avoid the experience, all the time, feeling an equal By Theresa Mack “All right, now, everyone in a circle,” I shouted, trying to sound calm and in control of things. Thirty fifth and sixth graders crowded into a circle in the corner of the classroom. It was my first day as video teacher at_P.S.7S. “We're going to play a game. Everyone will have a chance to use the camera and the microphone.” I handed the mike to the boy on my left, and gave the video camera to the girl sitting across from him. The kids on either side of her started pulling at the camera to look through it. She struggled to hold on and gave one of them a punch. *“‘Just wait a minute,” I said to the group, sensing their impatience. “You'll all get a turn. We're going to pass the camera and the mike around the circle. Each of you will use the camera to record the person opposite you as he introduces himself and tells us something about himself."’ Groans. “This is dumb,” someone mut tered. But I persisted with my plan. After all, I'd figured it all out ahead of time. The perfect introductory video exercise, I had thought. Everyone will get their hands on the equipment and everyone will appear on the tape. The video ideal. So I persisted. “T'll go first,” I volunteered good-naturedly, thinking the only problem was breaking the ice. I took the microphone from the boy next to me and began. “I’m Teri Mack. I'll be teaching video here this year.” I paused, feeling awkward. Who was I talking to, the kids or that camera pointed at me? ‘Ahhh...| live on 106th St...I just got a new bike that I like to ride in the park.” I was embarrassed. This is no way for people to talk to each other, I thought. But still I persisted. “OK, next, pass it on.’ The camera and microphone started moving slowly around the circle. Some kids giggled and blushed as they introduced themselves; other made smart-assed comments. All the while there were interruptions as someone clung to the camera and the next in line struggled to get it for himself. ‘Pass jt on!” | insisted, as kids:panned wildly around the room. “No, stupid,” screeched an experienced sixth grader to a kid clicking the camera button wildly, “don’t push the button. You just stopped the recording!” The circle had become a small mob of kids fighting over equipment and throwing insults and taunts at each other. “This is not working,”’ I proclaimed. There was a collective sign of relief. and the stuggling died down. “Why isn't it working?” They sensed I wasn’t playing games anymore, that I really was confused and wanted to hear what they had to say. “You feel stupid saying a sentence about yourself.” “I wanted to try out the camera. It’s no good if you have to i fascination for it. Whether we fight it or not, our reaction usually boils down to a simple inability to take our eyes off ourselves. I'believe that this experience is the crux of both learning and using video. I, along with many others, begin all my workshops with the presence of spontaneous video playback to facilitate the group and subject matter introductions. In the usual course of events, people begin to verbally introduce themselves, and suddenly find their voices trailing off while their eyes become fixed on the monitors where they are seeing their own faces staring back at them in confusion. Nervous laughter ensues and the next person stumbles along to keep things going with ‘my name is...and I work for..."’ A live video introduction will often take up most of the first night of video class. Usually no one will remember any one’s name or much else that was said but they do leave with an intense and énstant awareness of the unique qualities of the medium they are about to enter. One woman in a workshop surprised all of us by coming to the second session of the course with a radically different physical appearance. She was dressed in casual jeans and a flannel shirt in contrast to her chic dress of the first week. She had also cut her ‘Kids don't like pointless pass it right on.” cooperate."" “It’s just a dumb game.” Everyone drifted away from the*equipment, and I wandered around the room talkcingatg. kids tor the rest of the period. | liked the kids and felt sure we would do good work together, but I still felt uncomfortable about my introduction. ‘ “Later, I described the morning to a friend. “The kids just weren't up for it. They were too excited, the class atmosphere was too chaotic.”’ ‘‘no,” he said, “it was a bad idea. Kids don't like pointless games.” I winced. I knew what hesaid was true, and it hurt to hear it stated so baldly. I decided right then that, rather than spend more time on introductory video exercises, I would immediately begin working on substantive projects with kids. The next week I entered the clsssroom diffidently, feeling sure that I'd ruined my image as a respectable adult. But several kids Tan up to greet me, and a few pulled at my arm saying they wanted to make videntapes, | felt reassured. I needn't have worried about having things to do. Before long I was swept along on a wave of video projects proposed by kids or initiated by me or other members of the Teachers & Writers team. After working with kids on several projects, I've come to see my role as a kind of producer/director. I offer guidelines and define parameters that I think will insure the success of a project. I try to react honestly to ideas, to camera work, to interviews, offerin my personal standards of quality. At the same time, I struggle to remain open to expect the unexpected; to take risks with kids on projects that seem outrageous or doomed to failure; to acknowledge that sometimes my standards are substantiated only by conven. tion or habit and can, therefore, be influenced by the creative ways that children use video, DRAMATIC DOCUMENTARY: Tiere is no clear dividing line between fact and fiction, so when using video consider Integrating “drama” and “documentary” formats, Stydents can do video-research (interview someone, or explore a strange place with the camera), and then write a drama based on this information. For example, some might do an in-depth interview with an old person about his past, then write a drama based on the person’s life. The interview and drama could be shown together. Another approach would be to make a tape about an issue of concern, which interweaves a dramatic story-line with live-action and interviews, A dramatic structure may enable the students to make a more complex statement than if they were restricted to a standard documentary format. “Nobody. wanted to nie » Ae Tr egetati TOO SiR vm 9s alas <r ee 9/TeleVISIONS longish hair short. She explained that seeing herself the week before, she had been negatively impressed with her “goody two shoes’’ appearance and now wanted to look more individual and casual. These examples serve to remind us how video can effect our consciousness and potentially our behavior. In our workshops we attempt to structure situations for participants to isolate and experience the special characteristics of the medium. Video's spontaneity and visual intimacy and the specific dimensions of video space can be best undefstood through active encounters rather than through passive viewing or lectures. We have many professionals coming to our video workshops from the fields of education, therapy, theater, broadcast TV, and so on. Their presence reflects video's increasing entrance into these fields. It is often astounding to hear of video hardware acquisition by a school or other institution where no one has any idea of how or what to do with it. To meet the needs of people in these kinds of situations, our workshops have evolved from a heavy emphasis on equipment handling and production to include a much larger exposure to the uses of live and taped video in group processes. ames: creative video uses GRAFFITI IN THE STREETS. Two Graffiti-artists are caught in the act by a tough cop and thrown in jaii. As they sit ‘ in their cold cell, they reminisce about the thrills and trials of graffiti-writing. Effective use of sdocumentary and \ res (20 min., 6th graders) Photo: Este Gardner VIDEO HISTORY, Choose a particular time period in living memory (the depression, World War II, immigration in the early 1900's) and talk to several people about their lives during that time. Or do an in-depth interview with one person, allowing him to talk freely about his life. Or explore local history by talking to people who've lived in your area for most of their lives. You may want to videotape particular sections of town the person once knew well, then show the person these visuals while audiorecording his comments on what has changed. Old photographs could be used to supplement a video history, and might be particularly meaningful as part of a family history. After gathering this kind of oral history, you and your class might do an interesting study comparing the rich oral history of a particular era to the more one-dimensional record in a history textbook. ’ A Sth-6th grade class at P.S.75 has established a relationship with a senior citizens residence across from the school. In-depth interviews and video history, as well as collaborative works in drama, creative writing, film and video are developing out of children’s relationships with the residents. IN-DEPTH INTERVIEW. On-the-street or off-the-cuff interviews are easy to get. Instead, try some interviews which go deeper and give a sense of who the person interviewed is. Have plenty of tape wiht you and let it roll non-stop. _ You never know when your subject will relax and talk more personally or engagingly to hback scenes. — The use of this more conceptual, videoprocess, structure for basic classes hus been successful and in fact has also increased the motivation for participants to learn the more technical aspects of the medium. Sometimes, the exercises which we had planned would generate a need for skills that the participants hadn't yet mastered. This would require us to backtrack and deal with the technical gaps before we could carry out a specific video process. Generally, the integration of these levels has proved exciting for all of us in the workshops. Each group is dealing with a similar structure but the possibilities for responses to it are as diverse as the participants involved. After verbal and physical self-introductions using live video playback, we have used split screens combining camera images from two separate spaces, and experimented with video textures using materials like crepe’ paper, catsup and confetti to create images that explore the physical dimensions of videospace. After documenting simple movement in the studio, and practicing interaction with pretaped material, we introduced the portapac, recording highly structured exercises before breaking into teams to design and carry out a conceptual piece, shooting tape you. Let your subject see the video playback, and approve the final edit before it’s shown publicly. If possible, videotape your subjects in their everyday contexts, doing what they ordinarily do. As a variation, try making a tape that shows a person at work rather than tapes are the people around you everyday who you may know very little about. An Afternoon With Anna: Anna Heiney, Heiney, who lives in the senior citizens residence across the street from P.S.75, talks with children about her childhood and old age. MONOLOGUES & CAMEOS. In small groups, children develop dramatic stituations, and each child chooses a character. The children then develop their characters’ identities, through poetry—or songwriting. They should give careful thought to details, such as how the chatacter walks, talks and dresses, what his past was like, waat he thinks about when he’s alone. Then each child does an improvisational monologue based on his character development, and the monologue is videorecorded. A tripod-mounted camera with little camera movement is effective. Or turn the camera on and leave the student alone in the room if he wants. Playback the monologue immediately, and allow the student to redo it until he is satisfied. Three or four attempts are often necessary to develop a strong, authentic character. A series of such monologues done by related characters may then lead into a skit, which could be loosely scripted or improvisational. This activity can be the material for finished tapes, or an exercise for actors in a more complex or scripted drama. MONOLOGUES & CAMEOS, I: The Farmer and His Wife; Smart and Stupid Monsters; The Dressing Room. (30 min.) MONOLOGUES & CAMEOS,II: The President's Kidnappers; Rabbit.(20 min.) (both tapes made by 3rd-4th graders) VIDEO SOAP OPERA: Using television soap operas as a model, students may write their own soap opera, or perhaps even a series. They might do a spoof of a television show, which deals with love and hate, birth and death. Or they might attempt to deal with an unusual subject (e.g. fighting in the classroom) through this format. Imitation of the camera style and the melodramatic acting used in tv soaps will be important if the take-off is to be successful. SHADOWS OF LIFE: The Gilfrey family faces a crisis when the wife starts playing around with the mailman in this half tongue-in-cheek, half-serious Child’s Version of a Soap Opera. (IS min.; 4th-Sth graders) outside to be mixed with a live video performance. : There are as many exercises as there are people giving workshops around the country. As a first step in accumulating the experiences in process video and the beginnings of a theory about what works and PROCESS IS OUR MOST IMPORTANT PRODUCT why, we asked a few active video teachers to talk about their work. We are painfully aware of the limits of these discussions and invite our readers to send in their ideas, epiphanies, diaries, course descriptions, ledger books and responses out of which we can start to draw and share the lessons learned. Six years of workshops ~~ at NY's Global Village By John Reilly from an interview with Victoria Costello In 1969 we started Global Village, technically making us the first video group as such in the U.S. It was an. interesting period because no one knew what video was going to do. It was based on a breakthrough in technology, but as yet, a very primitive one. In 1969 we ran the first ad in the Village Voice for the first video workshop. Three people responded and they really didn’t have any idea what we were talking about. I had to phrase it in film terminology, as they were all filmmakers. They didn’t really understand till they got here and took a look at.it, that we weren't talking about film. Videotape, what is videotape? No one had ever seen it. It was an interesting but lonely beginning, a lot of people came to look, to see what we were doing but very few people were actually interested in it. It's a very different scene today where so many people want to experiment with video. It’s interestiug, though, that people still bring with them such misconceptions about video. There is little general consciousness of the differences between video and film and between video and TV. For me the evolution from film into video was primarily an emotional response. I didn’t realize this until later, but I think the reason I became so immediately enthusiastic about video has to do with the basic spontaneous quality of the medium. It was the idea that it was something that could be done watched and therefore evolved organically that was so exciting to me after having worked in film where there is such a delay in seeing the work. In the regular workshop sessions we use live video feedback techniques to teach operation of the hardware and at the same time to get people accustomed to using video playback for specific purposes. In one exercise each person creates on tape an environment that they would like everyone else to interact in. After everyone views one of these pieces, a second person responds to the first by creating another environment.....We encourage people to use multiple layers of video, for instance, last term we did a video version of ~ Krapp’s Last Tape. It's Becket's play of an id man who sits in a basement listening to an audiotape diary of his entire life. We did a video take-off on the same theme, so that the man was playing back pre-recorded videotape portions of his life. This was a useful project to teach past, present and future tenses of video and how they can be used in performance and production. Generally we try to encourage video students to involve the talent, the subjects, in the process of evolving the work. Either you bring them in as consultants on the editing, or you let them see the material as_ it's progressing, but in some way you alter your consciousness of the situation by involving people in it. It isn’t always successful, and some people don’t want to be involved, but this is what we encourage as a video process. It's also the essence of video consciousness. This is very much in contrast to film where you go in, shoot a subject and that is the last they see of you. Most filmmakers would be horrified if you said, for instance, “you're going to involve the Indians that you shot on the! reservation in the editing of the film.” They would reply in shock, ‘“‘What are you talking about it’s a technical thing to do in New York in a little room, it’s got nothing to do with Indians.” : It is the same lack of accountability that exists in network TV programming and often results in an underlying feeling on the part of those subjects that they are being ripped off, and rarely reflected. I don’t believe in committees editing tapes, it’s usually a disaster. I also don’t consider it a viable process to hand over the tape you've shot of a community group and to then ask them to come up with an edit. Even after a few ‘lessons’ you'll get a mish-mash back. The point is that these people don’t know the capabilities of the medium, or the artistry involved in an edit, but they sure as hell know their lives. You need a highly skilled video person performing the artistic task, and this is becoming more and more so as people begin to compare video to broadcast television. On the skills level we need to maintain a high standard of quality, but the content level, and on how you use it and where your head is at, that’s where the differences are at with video.