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How the film-strip pieces are made.












"In his video The Poetry of Facts, 2001, Slaughter executes
snapshot poses based on familiar movements from sources
such as martial arts, capoeira, yoga, action films, and
comic books. The artist begins by painting a four-foot
wide white semi-circle on an existing black wall and floor
to create the appearance of a sphere. Then, dressed in a
vibrant blue caftan, he slowly enters this brightly lit,
overexposed setting where all sense of orientation and
gravity is lost. In a single unedited take, he carefully
positions  his body and the cloth of the caftan to form one
predetermined, frozen pose after another: Run, Fall from
a Building, Hurdle Across, Sky Dive Behind, Chill,
Skedaddle. As Slaughter adjusts his pose, it becomes clear
how the illusion is constructed. After a few seconds, another
pose begins and we again suspend disbelief and adapt to the
illusion. Slaughter sees the unfolding of these poses as akin
to the process through which we fuse together and absorb
fragments from a multitude of social and cultural identities."

Catalog page from "Adaptive Behavior", 2004
New Museum of Contemporary Art, NY,NY.