das höhlengleichnis //// betaSP 15 min., sound //// © Rajele Jain 1991 PROJECTS //// HOME
DESCRIPTION //// IMAGES ////TEXTS //// CREDITS
The video can be shown in three ways:

1. as a single channel video

2. as a video installation

3. in tv

1. As a single channel video the text, enforced by the sound, is heard and a visual translation is reaching the eyes of the spectator.

The description of sitting in a dark cave, watching (and counting and measuring) shadows the whole life long, then suddenly getting freed, slowly starting to move up, being blended by the light of the sun, not able to see the things properly, then getting adjusted, first being able to see the shadows, then the colours and shapes and finally the sun itself....then going back to the cave, from the light to the dark, again not able to see anything properly, only flickering in front of the eyes, trying to convince the others that they are only seeing shadows..but looking like being blended..who will believe?

2. As a video installation the story is already related to a specific topic: the situation of watching tv to see "reality". The video is shown on a regular tv monitor whose surface is turned to the wall, but with a distance in between them, and shows its back to the spectator. The images are kind of reflected at the wall and illuminate a part of the room. The sound is heard and the spectator can listen to it and combine it with the situation: the image of a tv screen scattering its light around - the image one sees when looking out of the window of an apartment in the city and seeing the tv blinking out of many other windows of apartments in the street...

3. Broadcasted by a television channel, the idea of the project is even duplicated: the tv spectator sees the video as a single channel video, but he can already relate himself to all the others watching tv at the same time (..in the same cave) and, IF in an apartment house for example several people would watch this program, another one could listen to the sound of his own tv but see the installation by watching the other windows.

Moreover a special kind of tv interaction could happen if people were asked to turn their tv screen towards the wall before listening to the video....