The Edith Russ House for Media Art has become a film set for the duration of the exhibition, in which Crandall has worked on his new video installation together with participants in a workshop led by him. The concept of the new work, the process and the results of the workshop are presented in the upper part of the exhibition house. “Trigger” shows two soldiers chasing and targeting each other. The camera becomes the weapon and “Trigger” – the trigger – becomes a metaphor for the impulse that triggers both the concrete action, the shot, as well as more indifferent and individualized emotions and memories.  

A selection from the six-part video series “Drive” will be shown in the lower exhibition space. While the preparatory work for “Trigger” will be characterized by a rough, “work in progress” aesthetic, “Drive” has the smooth, cool aesthetic that ultimately also characterizes the end result of “Trigger” and Crandall’s work.

Crandall’s works have frighteningly concrete references to the current political situation. ‘Armed Vision’, a term coined by Jordan Crandall himself, describes the theme of his video installations very impressively. Crandall assumes that our views are becoming more and more ‘militarized’. Images of war and reports, dragnet searches and surveillance monitors everywhere not only satisfy voyeurism, but also increase the acceptance of surveillance and control by third parties.
Military technologies have played just as big a part in this development as the media. Images from surveillance and night-vision cameras, hidden cameras and, above all, images of theaters of war – recorded using highly specialized military technologies – dominate our everyday lives and give us a sense of security and control over a world that has become unmanageable. This feeling gives rise to a joy and desire to fight, which appears promising thanks to specialized technologies and is therefore perceived as a desire and joy to succeed. This struggle is conceivable in many forms: the ‘fight against terror’, the battle of the sexes and the inner struggle with/against oneself.

Jordan Crandall: “Heatseeking (Course Track)”, 1999-2000

“Quivering with tension, flesh pressed against metal, the movements of the combat device flow through the body like film through a projector. Restrained breaths, accelerated heartbeat and the slight vibration of the finger on the trigger mingle with the staccato of the celluloid driven by the machine. An eye glued to the viewfinder, a body in motion, a target moving through the field of vision. What is moving, how is it moving, how can this movement be followed, interrupted, recorded, depicted? All moving elements are synchronized in the explosive moment of the shoot. A target object that must be seen, saved, eliminated in the process of division: I/you, we/they, here/there. Body and machine meet at the trigger and await the explosive act of their deployment. See-name-fire. Perception organized, positions and boundaries defined, movements and forms outlined. A sacrificial image between perception, technology and the evasive movements of the body.”