'Broken Telephone', installation (posted on 19/12/11)

'Broken Telephone', installation, Nikos Georgopoulos.

'Broken Telephone is the name for a game played around the world, in which one person whispers a message to another, which is passed through a line of people until the last player announces the message to the entire group. Errors typically accumulate in the re-telling, so the statement announced by the last player differs significantly, and often amusingly, from the one uttered by the first. As well as providing amusement, the game shows how easily information can become corrupted by indirect communication'.

The installation is constructed by 2 pieces -in order to accomplish symbolically the 'broken telephone' effect; 'Fictional Biography', concept book and 'Love Song', video. It seems that both the book and the video stand by their own as 2 separate exhibits, although the latter exist because of the former; which in this case is fiction.

The 1st part of the installation is an artist book responding to an inquiry whether words are unreliable. In order to elaborate on my view -that words are neutral and that the debate whether they are reliable or unreliable it is completely irrelevant considering their nature- I introduced a female fictional character -Jessica- and wrote her sample biography. The story starts with the sentence:

'.. Jessica could be an adorable lady... or let me put it this way; Jessica is an adorable lady....'

So, I made up a story about her life; where she was born; her family and friends; her youth; her studies; journeys and -by arbitrary choice- concluded in an affair she had with a young man, whom she dumped. It is an example elaborating with the neutrality of words.

Instead of using hyperlinks I interrupted the narrative in various points by using brackets and quoting to the number of the image the reader should see, in terms of proofs. I designed the artist book to look like a conventional novel; typeset on Times New Roman, 14 points.

Fictional Biography, work in progress, 'analogue hyperlinks'. Photo by Nikos Georgopoulos

Love song, video on display as part of the installation. Photo by Nikos Georgopoulos

'Love-song' is the 2nd part of 'Broken Telephone'; it's a video performance and functions as an extension of the story of 'Fictional Biography'. By impersonating 'the young man who was in loved with her' I wrote and performed the song; I employed a rough approach as to create a sort of 'you tube', 'Google images' aesthetics. In addition to that, the installation works through the familiar language of advertising; 'Fictional biography' is an upcoming book and 'Love-song' its promo, viral video.

 

Nikos Georgopoulos