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Has anyone ever cried anything other than tears?
2019
three screen video installation with sound
11 mins 27 secs
installation view for exhibition Jeg kaller det kunst, Norwegian National Museum 2022
Has anyone ever cried anything other than tears? is a three screen doom metal text video installation. The video presents texts that were sourced from random daily updates from Quora.com, an online forum for crowd sourcing answers to questions that vary vastly in subject matter and are often posted anonymously. Excessive questions about loneliness, narcissism, longing, and misogyny are contrasted with questions about gym regularity, dietary control, dog care, and Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. Some of the questions suggest a societal vulnerability, and are tinged with the depressions, latent panic, and self doubts that a society of attention has exposed, whilst others are humorous, light hearted, or preposterous.
The rhythmic soundtrack intensifies this dual tragi-comic experience of the semiotics of the anonymous internet. The texts appear in quick succession to an edit of a track from the doom metal band Bongripper, providing a riff heavy, sludge filled rhythm to the work.