Vito Acconci

At first glance, the Vito Acconci film “Theme Song” is out of focus but then the camera zooms in on the face of Vito Acconci on the side of the screen. It was disorienting to see a face so close to the screen and staring directly at me. Vito Acconci speaks directly to the audience. He says “I can see your face in my mind,” and I felt like he was looking directly at me. Vito Acconci urges the viewer to pass through the normal audience to performer barrier. He is having a direct conversation and asking me to come and talk to him. There was a growing tension in the video. I felt like he had crossed a line and I was uncomfortable with him talking to me the way he was.

Vito Acconci’s direct contact with the audience and pleading for the viewer to come to him also illustrates the barrier between TV and the real world. We are “in another world,” and we can never actually talk to him. He wanted me to come to him even though that was completely impossible. TV is made to be a highly personalized medium; however, there is no way for people to respond back to his performance. Even though he seems real to me, he will never know who I am, and I will never respond to him in person.

The second video, “Undertone,” was even more disturbing for me to watch. As he sits down at the table and starts relaying his sexual fantasy to us, I felt like I was watching something that I was not supposed to watching. He brings the audience into a very personal and uncomfortable position. After a while of rambling about a sexual fantasy of his, he talks directly to the audience. He says that he needs to talk to an audience and needs to know that the audience will still be watching. He then starts rambling about the same fantasy but this time he is alone in his fantasy. Again it seems like a moment that is too personal to be on video. Your reaction to his performance is his actual performance. He wants the viewer to feel uncomfortable and see how personal video really can be.

Each shot in both videos is carefully planned. In “Theme Song” Vito Acconci places his face directly in front of the screen. This adds to the invasiveness of video because the viewer and Vito Acconci are literally face to face. In Undertone, the camera is placed at the other end of the table from Vito Acconci. The audience seems to be an acquaintance sitting across the table from a friend. Again the camera angle is strategically placed so that the audience feels like they are talking directly to the performer.

Overall, I did not enjoy watching either video. It took me outside of my personal comfort zone. The videos did however illustrate both how personal and invasive video can be. Even though video still has many limitations in the audiences ability to directly respond to the performer.