Agency
Leighton Pierce
Related: Q&A with Leighton Pierce
www.leightonpierce.com

In his latest work, film and video artist Leighton Pierce gives visual manifestation to one of modern society’s greatest fears: lost time.

Agency of Time (Toward part 2), a five-channel video, two-channel audio installation, uses lush, abstracted imagery and sound cues to draw the viewer into a world of broken visual lines where time is in control. Compared to some of Pierce’s past pieces, such as the all-encompassing 13-channel video, eight-channel audio installation Warm Occlusion (2005-06), this a is fairly spare work—but nonetheless thought-provoking.

The installation, on display in Coe College’s Sinclair Auditorium Galleries, 1220 First Avenue NE, Cedar Rapids from 3 to 5 p.m. daily through March 20, is just one part of Pierce’s most recent long-term project, which groups several artistic ventures under the umbrella title Agency of Time. There are three tiers to the project: multi-channel video/audio/photographic installations like the one at Coe (other installations have been at the Sheldon Museum of Art in Lincoln and The New Frontier On Main lounge during this January’s Sundance Film Festival), single-channel videos, and a book of still photographs.

Pierce constructed this alternative visual landscape in Agency of Time by building his video from still photographs. In his artist’s statement for the Coe exhibition, he writes: “I shoot each photograph to contain a marker of time/movement. I then build the video component by stringing and layering these images together.”

The installation consists of five videos projected on one long wall. Two sets of horizontal projections, which predominantly feature natural images of leaves and trees, act as a frame for the more active, squarish center projection. A soundtrack that includes dripping water, footsteps crunching leaves, and powerful blowing winds accompanies the images.

For the most part, the visual pieces are abstractions of recognizable objects. Occasionally, though, Pierce includes a clear shot—a square water well, a stone staircase, a woman looking out over a rocky bluff.

It is during these moments of focus that the loss of time becomes apparent.

For example, one section of film focuses on a moss-covered stone bench. Rather than a smooth visual approach as a person walking would normally see, Pierce has juxtaposed drastically different views of the bench. It is as if distinct visual moments in time have simply dropped out—as if time is toying with us, jerking us back and forth. The human eye, used to a seamless visual landscape, is faced with images that look both familiar and strange. It’s an unsettling experience.

The accompanying soundscape both contributes to the visual uncertainty and offers relief. The rise and fall of sounds, alternatively soothing (calm, dripping water) and agitating (powerful, rushing winds), creates a rhythm that structures the viewing experience, which might otherwise overwhelm.

Pierce shoots gesturally to create his abstract pictures, moving his hand in circular motions around objects. “I’m playing with that repetition of time through motion,” he says. “If I want a second of time of a cup, for example, I’ll take 8 to 16 photographs. Regular video might have 30 frames per second. There might be eight in mine. I’m interested in the time you miss.”

It is no coincidence that we feel discomfort viewing this installation. By offering entry into a world where time acts unexpectedly, Pierce forces us to confront what we intuitively feel but never want to admit: our time is not ours to control.