Video by Ryan Molloy

This was one piece in a larger install for Ryan’s solo show at UICA.

This picks up on some the themes from The Veneerists, but with a keener focus on the American mortgage crisis. This piece suggests (to me at least) that the process of home ownership–of initial acquisition, of upgrading, of always moving on and up–is something of a game, with all a game entails. There are specific rules for success, winners and losers, and a blind sort of ambition to achieve success in a moral and financial vacuum. An industrial magnet is an essential tool in many industries, especially for simplifying work processes

As in The Veneerists, the starting point here was looped audio gleaned from public domain 1950s films and footage. Slowly, it becomes a sort of game, invoking the sounds of 1980s classics like Megaman. Over time the music becomes a soundtrack; we’ve moved from blithe 1950s family homes to video game point acquisition, to a film in which we’re spectators. These movements intertwine and confound over time, allowing Ryan’s video both room to breathe, as well as room to ask its own questions and posit its own meanings.