THEY COULD NOT BE SEEN
2021
Made during lockdown and recently reinstalled, ‘They Could Not Be Seen’ presents coalescing visions of the ex-mining town, Dalmellington, East Ayrshire, to examine the emergence of a conspiratorial thinking that has defined our contemporary moment. The piece maps two distinct texts; videos on YouTube associated with the word ‘Dalmellington’, and videos uploaded to the alt-right platform Parler precisely geolocated to Dalmellington and the surrounding area.
In linking specific videos to accurate points on a map, this piece challenges narratives of rural survival preparation that are cornerstones in both the interlinking worlds of the alt-right and techno-capitalism. This act of exposure examines what it means to be seen, especially through a camera. By re-staging acts of looking and searching, ‘They Could Not Be Seen’ embraces the logic of how camera produced content moves online, asking what it means to be rural online.
This three-channel installation recalls industrial computer setups, paranoid bedrooms, and the cab of the Terex dump truck featured in the film. The slow reveal of a landscape through the pan of a camera is demonstrated as a gesture of power and ownership. Accompanied sonically by dense drone, heavily compressed imagery moves perpetually, exposing the inequity of who decides what a place is, and presenting fundamental contradictions within a landscape exploited unendingly by outsiders for physical and ideological resources.
2021
Made during lockdown and recently reinstalled, ‘They Could Not Be Seen’ presents coalescing visions of the ex-mining town, Dalmellington, East Ayrshire, to examine the emergence of a conspiratorial thinking that has defined our contemporary moment. The piece maps two distinct texts; videos on YouTube associated with the word ‘Dalmellington’, and videos uploaded to the alt-right platform Parler precisely geolocated to Dalmellington and the surrounding area.
In linking specific videos to accurate points on a map, this piece challenges narratives of rural survival preparation that are cornerstones in both the interlinking worlds of the alt-right and techno-capitalism. This act of exposure examines what it means to be seen, especially through a camera. By re-staging acts of looking and searching, ‘They Could Not Be Seen’ embraces the logic of how camera produced content moves online, asking what it means to be rural online.
This three-channel installation recalls industrial computer setups, paranoid bedrooms, and the cab of the Terex dump truck featured in the film. The slow reveal of a landscape through the pan of a camera is demonstrated as a gesture of power and ownership. Accompanied sonically by dense drone, heavily compressed imagery moves perpetually, exposing the inequity of who decides what a place is, and presenting fundamental contradictions within a landscape exploited unendingly by outsiders for physical and ideological resources.
Matthew Cosslett: They Could Not Be Seen from GSA MFA on Vimeo.