Murphy Maxwell

Plot Front

A delirious movie installed inside a ghostly barn made with prefabricated materials. The oscillatory movement of the rocking chairs on which visitors sit partly helps to alleviate the syncopated rhythm of the montage and the frenzy of images that follow. A series of brassy characters in wigs and thick make-up map the various locations of the film: a lazy river, a hobby barn, and forest watchtower.

Mark Trade

Shot in 2013 - In 'honor, of cause fake news - less gravity here - don't bird watch with a gun - remember your dreams before they remember you : the sloppy mix, bullshit version coming near soon USA.

Temple Time

Shot in a former Masonic temple in Los Angeles – a five-story warren of large, cavernous rooms akin to a windowless convention center – Temple Time unfolds like a horror-movie group expedition in a campsite wasteland.

Permission Streak

Permission Streak opens with a question: “Can you tell the difference between a camera and a camera?” Shown in a sculptural theater that combines aspects of gymnastics and aquatics facilities, the movie jumps jarringly between a string of unrelated vignettes, highlighting the potential for encountering confusion or deception in seemingly innocuous situations. Characters perform acts that suggest community participation, but do so under the constant threat of rejection and a sense of dread permeates the movie.

Yielders Path

The video displays Fitch and Trecartin's signature style of ludicrous cut-scenes and ironic hyperbole. “Yielders Path” also features swerving point-of-view shots from a quadrocopter, often focusing on ceiling fixtures with stoic reverence. The plot oscillates between mundane detail and highly saturated shenanigans, reiterated by a bazaar soundtrack that punctuates atmospheric compositions with pop music. “Yeilders Path” is presented on the ceiling of a black-curtained room, positioned with the same perspective of much of it’s subject matter. A large futon and theater seats nestled between fake plants provide an inviting viewing environment.

Comma Boat

In Comma Boat, we're stuck in a mock-authoritarian fantasy--a power trip. The film centers around a director-character played by Trecartin who oscillates between feelings of omnipotence and self-doubt. As if a post-human, post-gendered reincarnation of the Fellini character in 8 ½, the director gloats and frets about professional and ethical transgressions. "I know I lied to get ahead," he admits at one point. "I've made up so many different alphabets just to get ahead in my field." The director is fancier now, but the fear nags that he might be "repeating" himself "like a dumb soldier ova and ova and ova and ova." The meta-connection to the artist's own career, while obvious, is also a decoy. All art, at some level, is about the artist. Here, reflexivity is the surface level, providing a decodable veneer that encases something more unsettling and complex. Single-channel and 3-channel versions.

Center Jenny

The film focuses on the life of Jenny who has, according to many of the other characters, become too “left-of-center” while pursuing her interests.

Item Falls

In Item Falls, we are peaking. We start out at a casting call, but before long we're firmly in the grip of hallucination, shedding our anxieties and evidently regressing to the animation era, a time when stunt chickens were mere chicklets. Friendly archetypes float in and out of what seems like our bedroom. The red-headed Jenny has returned, but this time she's squeaky and trusting. Unlike in Center Jenny, here our perspective is literally centered. The camera seems to be the in middle of the room, which is good, because we're too blissed out to move. Luckily, our hallucinations look directly at us.