Humor

Color Schemes was exhibited in its installation form (with a self-service washing machine) at the Whitney Museum in 1990. Using the washing machine as a metaphor for the great American “melting pot” of ethnicity, the video presents individuals from a variety of ethnic backgrounds “representing” their ethnicity — in one sense by being on camera, and also by acting out or speaking about ethnic divisions. Cheang plays with this “overdetermiNation” of ethnicity, creating a multi-layered discourse on racism and assimilation that condemns the former and refuses to condone the latter.

Spit Sandwich is a compilation of 19 comical and entertaining works from the master of deadpan. Experiments with the video signal combine with visual jokes and one-liners to hilarious effect. Includes: II got . .Spit Sandwich is a compilation of 19 comical and entertaining works from the master of deadpan. Experiments with the video signal combine with visual jokes and one-liners to hilarious effect. Includes: II got . .

In this interview, American cartoonist and author Lynda Barry (b. 1956) describes the philosophy of teaching that has inspired and mobilized her art since the 1970s. For Barry, the connection between gesture and thought collide in drawing and expose the therapeutic possibilities of art. Whether teaching undergraduate art students or prison inmates, her goal is to help others develop art making skills as an “external immune system” that will protect and monitor their emotional and mental health.

This is sort of an Easter holiday affair as it has bunny images in it, plus the finale was shot on an Easter Sunday visit to a friend’s gallery. A springtime walk through a Pennsylvania landscape and a nautical section featuring an ex-student with X-rated ambitions helps this video to lay a colorful egg.

Walt Disney's re-imagineering of Martin Scorsese's classic film Taxi Driver follows Mickey Mouse-obsessed Travis Bickle as he looks for love in a rapidly transforming New York City. A 'fair use' parody by Bryan Boyce.

"A brilliant video essay."

-- Roger Ebert

“In The Girl Chewing Gum a commanding voiceover appears to direct the action in a busy London street. As the instructions become more absurd and fantasized, we realize that the supposed director (not the shot) is fictional; he only describes—not prescribes—the events that take place before him. Smith embraced the ‘spectre of narrative’ (suppressed by structural film) to play word against picture and chance against order.

In i am wise enough to die things go (2023), Syms explores the idea of psychosis through an unnamed protagonist reciting a monologue. Responding to the work of iconic animator Chuck Jones, Syms transfers the form and narrative structure of an animated short into live-action. Working with the inherent challenges and restrictions brought about by this sort of translation, she delves into both the breaking up of images and the breakdown of the psyche.

If you lived here you’d be home by now occurs during the years of Williamsburg Brooklyn’s overheated real estate market, just before the 2008 financial bubble burst. Ligorano Reese’s video renders the New York luxury high rise market of the aughts into an extraterrestrial lunar landscape. The voiceover is cut up and collaged from actual real estate copy descriptions of luxury living amenities. The video played in a storefront installation on Bedford Avenue, ground zero for Brooklyn’s rabid transformation of the East River in New York City.

The waters run deep as massive jaws chomp and bubbles burst in a world gone mad with technological delusion and prehistoric puppetry.

A military installation is beset by unidentified flying objects while the personnel try to come to grips with their own mysterious yearnings and the cumbersome protuberances that protrude from their own species.

Pagan and Christian souls clash in this student-collaborated mix of the defrocked and the deflowered.

Greasepaint flows freely as talents of Tinseltown strut their stuff amid the rundown dreams of days gone by.

In Animal Charm's masterful example of video montage, a monkey is mesmerized as he watches two dolphins toss a woman from snout to snout. Go cross-eyed with cross-cutting. Sometimes, in order to prevent the insidious absorption of mass media, it is necessary to apply Vaseline to your eyes and ears. Other times, you only need to watch Stuffing — it’s inside of everything.

A daily chronicle of the Ashaninka community during the rainy season, recorded on video during a workshop in a village on the Amônia River in the state of Acre. The involvement of the filmmakers with the Ashaninka community makes the film go beyond a mere description of activities, reflecting the rhythm of the village and the humor of its inhabitants.

Direction and photography by Valdete, Isaac, and Tsirotsi Ashaninka, Llullu Manchineri, Maru Kaxinawá, Nelson Kulina, Fernando Katuquina, and André Kanamari; edited by Mari Corrêa.

In Ashaninka with English subtitles.

The pages of books that deal with nostalgia and the vanishing vistas of America's past are infiltrated by the appreciative presence of two hulks from today, who go their own ways through the by-ways and highways of an illustrated yesteryear. One salutes the creator of this painted paradise, while the other delves within himself to vomit up columnous verbiage amidst the detailed backdrops. 

Animals debate the sticky subject of body dysmorphia and the merits of reconstructive surgery in this short animation.  

"Jessie Mott wrote the script for this, recorded the voices and made the drawings.  I constructed the soundtrack and animated her drawings."
--Steve Reinke

This flashy drama about theater life was made with my students at the San Francisco Art Institute and follows the various personalities that make up the show-biz milieu of a fictitious city on a fog bound coast. The fog is thick and so is the plot as it plunges into a series of dramatic interludes which include musical numbers, war scenes, ballets, and erotic shenanigans involving the living and the animated dead.

A volcano self-destructs ages ago, leaving in its wake a great emptiness which is filled with all that is cold and blue. Into that blueness there gazes a horde of cellulite-laden damsels pursued by balding bullies with light meters unzipped, ready to specify F stops and G spots. A great and mythical beast lurks within and without, and below there spreads out, for all to see, the blue gaze of mount Mayama; once a vengeful bitch… now a magnificent ditch: a crater of unapproachable serenity and scorn: a crater lake.

After working in solitude at the studio, the artist leaves, uncomfortable with the idea of having to put on a face for the art world, where they expect you to say something articulate in order to grab the curator's attention.

In this interview, American artist, independent curator, writer, and experimental filmmaker, Vaginal Davis reflects on her initiation into the punk rock and art scenes of Los Angeles during the 1980s and 90s, her stylistic influences, and her ongoing efforts to theorize queerness and visuality. Caught between the opposing poles of Hollywood classicism and the rawness of punk, Davis defines her unapologetically gender-bending, campy, and at times aggressively critical performances as scenarios, rather than spectacles or entertainment.

A rockumentary about East Village club Pyramid star John Sex. The blonde, coifed performer exposes his penchant for padding his package with socks and explains that his last name is the result of his ancestors’ “Americanization” of his native name Sexton. Featuring Miss Maggie, Katy K, Tom Rubnitz, Kenny Scharf, and Kestutis Nakas.

This title is also available on Tom Rubnitz Videoworks: Sexy, Wiggy, Desserty.

This title is only available on Kip Fulbeck Selected Videos: Volume One.

A caricature of a professor teaching English to non-native speakers. Her mannerisms, her accent, the content of her speech—all are absurd, in the tradition of an Ionesco character. Images of the professor alternate with collages, many taken from Bobe’s other works. Through its ironic humor, La Profesora foregrounds the absurdity of teaching English in a country where many cannot read their native language. The prevalence of the English language in post- and neo-colonial societies is thus called into question, both politically and socially.

Originally recorded during 1975-76 and re-mastered in March 2005, this selection of 11 skits mostly focuses on Man Ray. Wegman appears to test his faithful friend, continually throwing a ball for him to catch even after the dog loses enthusiasm; playing with a cardboard tube which intermittently emits a loud sound recording, alternately attracting and repelling the dog; pulling a cord attached to his leg while making him “stay”. Wegman also take a leap into the world of color with special effects and a monolog about furniture. Includes:

The season sweeps through in a blur of glitches, gulps and sweetened goo, as chimes wring out the old and ring in the new.