Index

Index was an EMPAC-commissioned public art installation by Rensselaer arts alumni Jennifer and Kevin McCoy, consisting of multiple sculptures filmed via small cameras. The resulting live video projections, as well as the models, were presented throughout EMPAC’s public spaces during an extended residency with the artists. Inspired by a J.G. Ballard short story that consists primarily of an alphabetized index of people and places suggesting a global conspiracy, the McCoys’ list spans the 1960s to today, referencing globalization, technology, mass migrations, and war. Corporate campuses, film sets, Spanish Colonial Revival architecture, and factories all collide in a globalized, mediated framework that exists to support utopian goals, even as it rests upon resource depletion, financial instabilities, and entropic decay.

Jennifer and Kevin McCoy’s multimedia artworks examine the genres and conventions of filmmaking, memory, and language. They are known for constructing subjective databases of existing material and making fragmentary miniature film sets with lights, video cameras, and moving sculptural elements to create live cinematic events.

Quote Unquote was an interdisciplinary series presenting work by artists that use an existing text as a departure point for time-based works including installation, film, and performance.