The Floods

Overview

THE FLOODS is a massive video experience (96x20ft) in the Crane Icebox that immerses spectators in a kaleidoscopic journey in marshlands and industrial wastelands of the Anthropocene now being transformed by floods.

The work addresses questions of land-use, industrial contamination and sea-level rise through richly layered images, sound and generated language. Viewers travel along the marshlands and industrial wastelands of our local watershed and others worldwide that are shaped by industrialization. The sounds, images and text flow like waters, following a computer-code based system that gathers materials together in ever-changing experiences. Like ocean tides, the code-driven work is always changing.

Roderick Coover’s images, gathered over the past decade from journeys on and around our rivers, combine with field recordings, voices and electronic sounds composed by Adam Vidiksis, that activate the unique reverberation of the massive Icebox space. Nick Montfort draws from Coover’s logs to create a continually evolving, poetic text. The remarkable spectacle reveals forces of flow, floods and chemical contamination. Visitors plunge into the imaginaries of times present and future in a work that attempts to put into words the unspeakable threats posed to existence, time and belonging.

Suitable for all ages, THE FLOODS stimulates the imagination to find ways to make sense of the environment and climate change. Average viewing time for the ever-changing experience is 25-50 minutes. Viewers can move about the space or make use of optional seating, and Crane Arts is a accessible building

The installation runs Sept. 8-12 with extended hours on Sept. 9 during 2nd Thursday arts openings at the Crane. The exhibition is free. On Friday and Saturday evenings, there will also be two special, ticketed events with live orchestration to the cinematic experience. See THE FLOODS LIVE CONCERT EXPERIENCE on the FringeArts Website.

Roderick Coover - Adam Vidiksis - Nick Montfort

Roderick Coover is a Philadelphia-based media artist. His work is internationally exhibited in venues such as the Venice Biennale Hyperpavillion, The Nobel Peace Prize Forum and Documenta Madrid and recipient Fulbright, LEF and Adam Mickiewicz awards among others. Adam Vidiksis is a Philadelphia-based musician who has received awards from the American Composers Forum, National Endowment for the Arts and ASCAP among others; his works are available through HoneyRock Publishing, EMPiRE, New Focus, PARMA, and SEAMUS Records­­­. Nick Montfort is a New York-based writer whose computer-generated books of poetry include #!, Autopia, The Truelist, and Hard West Turn. The work is produced by Chouette Collective with support from the Temple University Center For The Performing And Cinematic Arts.

Credits

Artist/Filmmaker, Director: Roderick Coover.
Composer: Adam Vidiksis.
Computational Poetry: Nick Montfort.
Technical Assistant: Jonah Pfluger.
Intern: Alex Glass.
Production House: Chouette Collective LLC Made possible with support from the Temple University Presidential Humanities and Arts Award Program, The Temple University Center For Performing And Cinematic Arts Vice Provost In The Arts Award Program, Temple University Grant-In-Aid, and Chouette Collective LLC.