Sunday, October 10, 2010
David Hoffos: Scenes from the House Dream @ MOCCA, Toronto
Scenes from the House by David Hoffos is a dose of nostalgia, bringing me back to my childhood, reminding me of a time when my classmates stood in awe with our imaginations in overdrive while looking into historical dioramas and miniature models on school field trips. David Hoffos creates a magical experience, transporting the audience to another place. What is truly going on throughout this installation is hard to define, but it’s ambiguity is what I feel makes it so interesting and engaging.
SPOILER ALERT
Like ‘Alice in Wonderland,’ Hoffos similarly throws the viewer through black curtains and immerses the viewer in complete darkness as they enter the installation, and arguably a different world. Suddenly, the viewer is cut off from the reality of Queen Street, and instead, with a heightened aural sensory, the ambiguous modulating sounds pull the viewer into what seems to be a dream. Once eye sight adjusts and pupils dilate, this sense of a dreamscape is heightened by ambivalent feelings towards the human ‘phantoms’ that loom in the corners of the space. Like facing the ‘unseen-monster’ in a dream, the realism of the projected ‘cofee-drinking phantom’ created a large degree of anxiety as my imagination soared. My heart raced wondering whether this phantom will pop out of the corner like something out of a haunted house. In addition to the ‘phantom’ illusions, the crown and jewel of the installation are to Hoffos’ 3D dioramas, which for me shape a sense of a particular place and time. Viewing these dioramas I felt God-like. A voyeur spying on the everyday life of a futuristic 1950’s suburbia. This ambiguity of an underlying narrative is what I feel makes this exhibit so successful as there is room for the viewer to get lost in their imagination as I did, subconsciously exploring scenarios.
But what I find just as exciting, if not more, was the methodology that Hoffos reveals by first including the viewer in an interactive diorama and then through a peep-hole into the heart of the exhibit where Hoffos complex and yet primitive use of technology becomes evident. Even though the technique is revealed, it isn’t entirely, allowing the viewer to once again let their imagination attempt to grasp a hold of something concrete in a space that is anything but.
Hoffos’ experimentation with alternative forms of interactive media in conjunction with the realm of fiction and dreams achieves something that is absent in glorified ‘cinema’ such as James Cameron’s 2009 “Avatar” and Christopher Nolan’s 2010 “Inception.” By no means am I attempting to undermine the potential of film as a medium, but rather what I am alluding to the success of Hoffos in captivating an audience through 3D without the big budget and fancy technology. Hoffos’ archaic technological experimentation in Scenes from the House Dream, 2010 highlights the potential for interactive media in creating a truly magical experience as it situates the viewer within the narrative creating a truly unique experience.
My experience included:
-feeling of God
-critical look at suburbia
-seeing the poetic tragedy in suburbia
-seeing the beauty in suburbia
-connection to Arcade Fire’s “The Suburbs” (music)
-ambivalence towards suburbia
-sense of isolation
SPOILER ALERT
Like ‘Alice in Wonderland,’ Hoffos similarly throws the viewer through black curtains and immerses the viewer in complete darkness as they enter the installation, and arguably a different world. Suddenly, the viewer is cut off from the reality of Queen Street, and instead, with a heightened aural sensory, the ambiguous modulating sounds pull the viewer into what seems to be a dream. Once eye sight adjusts and pupils dilate, this sense of a dreamscape is heightened by ambivalent feelings towards the human ‘phantoms’ that loom in the corners of the space. Like facing the ‘unseen-monster’ in a dream, the realism of the projected ‘cofee-drinking phantom’ created a large degree of anxiety as my imagination soared. My heart raced wondering whether this phantom will pop out of the corner like something out of a haunted house. In addition to the ‘phantom’ illusions, the crown and jewel of the installation are to Hoffos’ 3D dioramas, which for me shape a sense of a particular place and time. Viewing these dioramas I felt God-like. A voyeur spying on the everyday life of a futuristic 1950’s suburbia. This ambiguity of an underlying narrative is what I feel makes this exhibit so successful as there is room for the viewer to get lost in their imagination as I did, subconsciously exploring scenarios.
But what I find just as exciting, if not more, was the methodology that Hoffos reveals by first including the viewer in an interactive diorama and then through a peep-hole into the heart of the exhibit where Hoffos complex and yet primitive use of technology becomes evident. Even though the technique is revealed, it isn’t entirely, allowing the viewer to once again let their imagination attempt to grasp a hold of something concrete in a space that is anything but.
Hoffos’ experimentation with alternative forms of interactive media in conjunction with the realm of fiction and dreams achieves something that is absent in glorified ‘cinema’ such as James Cameron’s 2009 “Avatar” and Christopher Nolan’s 2010 “Inception.” By no means am I attempting to undermine the potential of film as a medium, but rather what I am alluding to the success of Hoffos in captivating an audience through 3D without the big budget and fancy technology. Hoffos’ archaic technological experimentation in Scenes from the House Dream, 2010 highlights the potential for interactive media in creating a truly magical experience as it situates the viewer within the narrative creating a truly unique experience.
My experience included:
-feeling of God
-critical look at suburbia
-seeing the poetic tragedy in suburbia
-seeing the beauty in suburbia
-connection to Arcade Fire’s “The Suburbs” (music)
-ambivalence towards suburbia
-sense of isolation
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