Andrew James Paterson

Rectangular World 9 minutes 2006

Rectangular World is structured upon a telephone conversation between two unseen female artists and/or cultural observers. These friends, who agree to look out for each other, discuss and argue the definitions and limitations of loaded words such as "community" and "scene" and "society", both with regard to themselves and also to a recently deceased young-male colleague who didn't particularly fit into any easily-defined scene or community.

Visually, Rectangular World is completely cameraless. It does use some Video-blinking and Video-noise. The tape consists almost entirely of Photoshop drawings that resemble serial low-income housing units and also minimalist sculpture and colour-field paintings. These images are completely rectangular. A scanned photograph which may or may not represent the deceased youth periodically occurs, and flickering black and white images frequently appear in windows intrinsic to the rectangular buildings. The flickering may or may not have something to do with the intense thunderstorm audible on the soundtrack during the entire telephone-conversation.

Rectangular World was produced at and by Trinity Square Video for its Fraternité residency in 2006.

Rectangular World English

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