The suspension of disbelief is often an essential element in creating an act of magic. It is in the contract between the performer and the audience that they are going to believe what they see in order to enjoy the show. But what happens when you break this contract? What happens when you allow the audience to experience the illusion, but also see the apparatus that operates it? In this 4D class, students will use video, performance, sound and other strategies to create time-based art exploring and stretching various techniques of the suspension of disbelief. The course familiarizes students with examples from fine art, theatre and pop culture that break the 4th wall, such as William Shakespeare, Aukje Dekker, Ira Eduardovna, Lars von Trier,Elaine Sturtevant, Keren Cytter and Vito Acconci.

This studio-based course starts with a single idea: that in the sphere of 4D, control over message is proportionally empowered by control over medium. In this course, we will build on two fronts simultaneously. First, students will gain greater control over tools: from intermediate to advanced camera and lighting, advanced and experimental sound and video editing, to effective green-screening and an introduction to animation in After Effects, 3D, and VR platforms. Demos will be supported by in-class workshops and collaborative exercises, culminating in one or two longer-form projects of the students’ devising. Second, we will look at the history of moving image as cultural intervention and political sabotage, from early concepts of the machine eye to video art’s origins in performance, from experimental documentary to synthetic abstractions that modify and destroy their sources. We will consider how artists have used the powerful tools of moving image to expose hidden truths and reimagine the possible.