AUX Curatorial Fellow, Whitney Kimball, is proud to debut “Pig Story”, a film conceived by inmates at the Lincoln Correctional Facility in Manhattan, and produced in the spring of 2014 by video/performance artist Miles Pflanz and sound artist Kate Levitt. The film represents the experience of incarceration through a fictional story of monster pigs, told through deranged flashing visuals, primal electronic noise, and a motorcycle stunt.
The artists describe the project thusly, in an August edition of Artist’s Notebook, Animal New York:
Prisoners’ movements are strictly regimented. They are denied not only public life, but any shred of autonomy. The nightmare of claustrophobia is their breathing existence. Virtual reality treatments are shown to relieve effects of claustrophobia. Imagining a similar therapeutic effect using video art, we suggest that they come up with images they’d like to see. They do not want to view anything in particular. They’d rather make a video that presents their own conditions to an otherwise indifferent or ignorant audience. They want to share with the world what they share with each other – experiences of frustration, immobility, claustrophobia. In the course of writing a video, they reduce these experiences to concrete images – the repetition of handcuffs clicking, doors opening and closing, stillness while the rest of the world is in motion, daydreams of release. From these images and gestures, the prisoners form a basic narrative about two people in a train who are subjected to repetitive handcuffing by pig masked police. They escape this and enjoy simple liberties – changing clothes, traveling freely, enjoying public spaces, and being able to read what they’d like.
“Pig Story” will be followed by a screening of short individual video forays by both artists. Miles Pflanz is a video artist and co-founder of Bushwick’s Fitness Center for Arts and Tactics. Kate Levitt is a sound artist, drummer, co-founder of the Baltimore noise collective Teeth Mountain and past performer with the Dan Deacon Ensemble.
Cast of Pig Story:
Prisoners: Adjua Greaves and James Moore
Motorcycle stunt by Sigrid Lauren
Three Little Pigs played by RVL, Nick Brujos, and Tiny Leg
BIOS
Miles Pflanz’s video work documents public provocations, the aimless rage of youth counterculture, and the trance-like effects of intoxication, manual labor, and political violence. His visual vocabulary draws heavily from non-narrative and gesture focused media: skate tapes, viral videos, amateur pornography, and low budget action movies. Working intensively with collaborators in the performance art and experimental music underground, his videos point to the utopian possibilities of clandestine group action.
Kate Levitt is perhaps best known for her appearance on Judge Judy, however, she is also a percussionist. In her new solo project Lines, Levitt uses drums, found sounds, and voice in order to create drones. Her work is informed by Haitian Rara but also takes cues from experimental electronic music. Her solo work can be found here.
