Beeld
21/4/2004 16:49 - (South Africa)
Review:
Play with visual consumerism
Leone van Niekerk

Eat @ Outlet (translated by Franci Cronje)

You are what you eat (as Oprah says), and this is the essential thought behind the acclaimed digital artist Nathaniel Stern's latest work, commenting on global popular culture.

Stern suggests that consumerism involves much more than only alcohol, cigarettes, trade names, and television programmes. Through the use and mis-use of ideas, symbols and language, the identity of the individual is being consumed so that no one can escape the commencing consumer orgy.

The projected installation lasts about three and a half minutes, and is presented in the manner of a triptych. On the left hand is a close-up of a mouth with projected directly on a physically mounted fan that sucks the speaker's stream of words like hot air.

On the right hand side, a video image turns with a "digital" fan composed out of fragments of the speaker's face. The American flag or lone words appear, fade away, or multiply on the middle panel. A schematic frequency of the voice-over zigzags in a frenetic frame beneath all three.

The speaker, who identifies himself as the American-South-African artist, lists slowly what he consumes, escalating until the fevered cadence of stringed needs ands words mimics the fan's rotations.

As visual consumer, the viewer cannot help but be impressed with Stern's visual play with parody, and his mastering of the digital medium. However, Eat, an edition for sale as one of five DVD's, with a unique digital print with each one, becomes another one of the consumer products that one can take, or leave.