Zoe Beloff

Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI) is pleased to present a selection of works recently added to our distribution catalogue. The evening takes its title from one of Cory Arcangel’s Runners series videos: a screen recording of a live bot performance on Walmart’s Instagram feed, in which the bot systematically “likes” every post, undermining the genuineness of Walmart’s slogan, and the supposed engagement with its customers. Videos in this screening share an emphasis on human care, curiosity, and idiosyncrasy as artists utilize evolving tools and platforms to witness the multidirectional links between technology, labor, and interpersonal relationships.

In this array of short videos, artists contend with the larger topics of AI, “essential” work, labor economies, and the false naturalization of technological progress. Two videos from Zoe Beloff and Eric Muzzy’s @ Work series (2022), now installed as a mural at the Electrical Industry Training Center in Long Island City, will bookend the evening. Following an expanded definition of “essential worker,” Beloff and Muzzy conducted interviews throughout New York City reflecting on cultural economies of labor and the diverse, often overlooked, skillsets involved in her interviewee’s vocations. Sondra Perry’s phantom. menace. (2023) uses AI DALL-E animation software to play out a speculative interaction based on a version of Perry’s Newark studio, formerly a barbershop. Kit Fitzgerald’s Romance (1986) comprises vibrant, computer-generated video paintings live-edited and set to original music by Peter Gordon. Cory Arcangel’s Transitions (2007), A Couple Thousand Short Films about Glenn Gould (2007), and Making Your Life a Little Easier (2020) make use of popular digital-age forms such as the stock video transition, social media feed, and self-directed YouTube performances to contextualize the relationships between these tools, their users and audiences, and technological development at large. Finally, Kristin Lucas’ Inforeceptor (1994), shot on Hi-8 and Super-8, provides a playful yet ominous anticipation of the then-cresting World Wide Web.

Following the program, there will be an informal chat with artists Kit Fitzgerald, Zoe Beloff, and Michael Britto. An online, closed-captioned version of this program will be accessible for a limited time in March.

Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI)’s venue is located at 264 Canal Street, 3W, near several Canal Street subway stations. Our floor is accessible by elevator (63" × 60" car, 31" door) and stairway. Due to the age and other characteristics of the building, our bathrooms are not ADA-accessible, though several such bathrooms are located nearby. If you have questions about access, please contact cstrange@eai.org in advance of the event.

If you are experiencing a fever, cough, shortness of breath, loss of taste or smell, or other symptoms that could be related to COVID-19, we ask that you please stay home.

Image: Sondra Perry, phantom. menace. (2023). A warped, AI-generated closeup of two Black men shaking hands, shrouded in green light against an abstract blue background.

Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI) is pleased to partner with Metrograph to present a series of programs highlighting our catalogue and its essential role in the history of artists’ moving image work. This program coincides with our ongoing celebration of EAI's 50th anniversary.

Continuing this November, EAI presents a slate of works for both Metrograph's theater as well as its At Home online platform. The second installment of this program will focus on artists who have embraced the radical potential of mass media, and iterative possibilities of videotape and broadcast. Throughout the month, we will screen theatrical engagements of Robert Beck/Buck’s Cruising (Back to Front), a scene-by-scene reversal of William Friedkin’s notorious thriller; Zoe Beloff’s trilogy of works exploring unrealized Hollywood films by radical artists (Sergei Eisenstein, Bretolt Brecht, and James Agee, respectively); and Ulysses Jenkins and Video Venice News’ Remnants of the Watts Festival, documenting the annual summer music festival in the southeast Los Angeles neighborhood. On Metrograph’s streaming platform, we present a showcase of Robert Beck/Buck’s short video works, and two programs pairing artists Jaime Davidovich and Kristin Lucas, and Shana Moulton and Trevor Shimizu.

In theaters:

Cruising (Back to Front)
Robert Beck/Buck, 1998
Monday, November 15th, 8:30 pm
With introduction by Robert Beck/Buck

Fragments for a Future: Brecht, Agee, and Eisensten
Three Works by Zoe Beloff
Zoe Beloff, 2015-2019, 104 min
Monday, November 22th, 8:30 pm
With introduction by Zoe Beloff

Remnants of the Watts Festival
Ulysses Jenkins, 1972-73, 60 min
Monday, November 29th, 8:30 pm

At home:

Shorts works by Robert Beck/Buck
Available November 16th to 21th
With introduction and conversation by Robert Beck/Buck

Short works by Jaime Davidovich and Kristin Lucas
Available November 23th to 28th

Short works by Shana Moulton and Trevor Shimizu
Available November 30th to December 5th

EAI is pleased to host a book launch for Zoe Beloff's A World Redrawn: Eisenstein and Brecht in Hollywood, published by Christine Burgin and distributed by Artbook / D.A.P. The evening will feature a screening of Beloff's Glass House, a short film featuring Jim Fletcher and Kate Valk, based on Sergei Eisenstein's notes and drawings for a science fiction movie that he pitched to Paramount Studios in 1930. The screening will be followed by a conversation between Beloff and writer and scholar Anastasiya Osipova, with EAI's Rebecca Cleman.

A World Redrawn: Eisenstein and Brecht in Hollywood will be available for purchase at the event.