I Shall Warrant Ye, is a video sculpture shown on an iPhone connected to a power bank disguised as a vape.
I SHALL WARRANT YE was exhibited at the Guerilla exhibition series, Áit 002, on an iPhone 8.
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Installation:
With the video and the installation, I wanted to lean into the scrappiness of the exhibition. I was intent on fighting the urge to show the piece on a standard projector or monitor, especially since its themes are so focused on the ubiquity of information and misinformation readily available in any piece of technology with internet access.
Playing into showing the piece on an iPhone, it gives the piece a specific context: that of an iPhone stuck on a loop of brain-rot content, connected to a vape: constantly dipping in and out of wanting a hit of the vape.
The constant production of disposable vapes is analogous to the constant production of disposable media/content made for quick satisfaction.
The Title:
The title is taken from the etymological source of the phrase ‘Swanee’, or a genteel way of saying ‘I swear’, or ‘I declare’. Originally based on the George Gershwin piece of the same name, I had conceived of an analogue of the story of Leda and the Swan, in which Leda and Zeus switch roles, and instead of being a beautiful young woman, Leda is a brain-rotted young man named Swanee, on the session, and eager to mythologise himself in an effort to see himself within the context of all of human history, and Zeus is a swan, unable to change the hand of fate.
Monologue/writing:
I drew heavily from W.B. Yeats’ poem decontextualising the story of Leda and the Swan, which depicts the myth as an understanding of hard determinism and whether human beings, while possessing enough free will to question our fate, are capable of understanding or even changing our place in the grand scheme of history.
The monologue is referential in style to reddit and quora story posts, in which, real or not, the writer lays out a story, positioning themselves as the hero or anti-hero.
I SHALL WARRANT YE was exhibited at the Guerilla exhibition series, Áit 002, on an iPhone 8.
Installation:
With the video and the installation, I wanted to lean into the scrappiness of the exhibition. I was intent on fighting the urge to show the piece on a standard projector or monitor, especially since its themes are so focused on the ubiquity of information and misinformation readily available in any piece of technology with internet access.
Playing into showing the piece on an iPhone, it gives the piece a specific context: that of an iPhone stuck on a loop of brain-rot content, connected to a vape: constantly dipping in and out of wanting a hit of the vape.
The constant production of disposable vapes is analogous to the constant production of disposable media/content made for quick satisfaction.
The Title:
The title is taken from the etymological source of the phrase ‘Swanee’, or a genteel way of saying ‘I swear’, or ‘I declare’. Originally based on the George Gershwin piece of the same name, I had conceived of an analogue of the story of Leda and the Swan, in which Leda and Zeus switch roles, and instead of being a beautiful young woman, Leda is a brain-rotted young man named Swanee, on the session, and eager to mythologise himself in an effort to see himself within the context of all of human history, and Zeus is a swan, unable to change the hand of fate.
Monologue/writing:
I drew heavily from W.B. Yeats’ poem decontextualising the story of Leda and the Swan, which depicts the myth as an understanding of hard determinism and whether human beings, while possessing enough free will to question our fate, are capable of understanding or even changing our place in the grand scheme of history.
The monologue is referential in style to reddit and quora story posts, in which, real or not, the writer lays out a story, positioning themselves as the hero or anti-hero.
Research:
In my research, I came to find that what I had thought was simply a piano score, was actually worked into a musical number for Al Jolson, in which he performed in black face, singing from the perspective of a captive slave in the American South. This was an interesting development for my research, as the topic of minstrelsy is obviously a tricky one to deal with respectfully. But it does leave one to wonder about modern blackface, and digital blackface: in which people post online pretending to be black and claiming or underplaying victimisation. See: Dean Browning’s tweet which he clearly intended to post to a fake account.
Even though Swanee doesn’t deal with race, it does deal with feeling disenfranchised and choosing violence as a means of empowerment. Watching the Jolson performance, there are so many layers of deeply racist historical context and the understanding that Jolson, a white man in the 30s, was playing a performer, playing a caricature of a black man, playing a slave who has accepted his fate but longs to go back to his home by the Swanee river.
The idea of pretending to be victimised and portraying yourself as disenfranchised ended up playing heavily into the script.
Swanee was then sung by Judy Garland in her 1954 iteration of ‘A Star is Born’, which for me drew allusions between the state of cinema at the time and the contemporary rise of tube sites and internet media as forms of entertainment.
Video :
The original concept for the video was to be footage I had taken of the swans from the Naturbad Nordost lake in Leipzig, but putting it together it lacked vitality. It was too literal.
As I’m an avid spectator of speed-running, I thought of the TikTok/Instagram reel brain rot videos, which often read out posts from Reddit and Quora in an AI generated voice while having two videos running along side each other, often a game and some kind of ‘satisfying ASMR’ video.
I chose a Tool Assisted Speedrun of Wind Waker made by MrAlberto and TASer TrogWW. Of all games to chose, I think Wind Waker has interesting glitches that evoke the themes and action of Swanee while remaining stylistically separate from the blocky games du jour that are often played over these brain-rot videos.
Below the Wind Waker footage is videos of assembly line food production which feed into the satisfying ASMR content.
The idea to have the story be read by the AI generated voice of Joe Biden came from pure necessity, but I think it achieved in appearing very realistic to brain-rot content that does the same.
The beat is a sample from the B-side of the Buqa Boyz mixtape, ‘Miami Arab Emirates’.
The song at the at the loading screen is a sample of Italo disco singer, Angel’s ‘I know - hard version’.
The choice to add a dead battery loading screen at the end with the phrases: “I love vaping”, “Bro me to i love vaping and podjuice of course”, “i like seeing all the different tanks, mods, and flavours of juice of course.”, and “Vaping love your money.” layered over each other are taken from a reddit post titled ‘I love vaping’.