Adynata

Leslie Thornton

1983, 30 min, color, sound

Deploying fragments of sound and image in a confounding shell-game, Adynata challenges notions of Asianness and the East. Thornton, appearing in the guise of a 19th-century Mandarin and his wife, explores oppositions of femininity and masculinity concealed in Orientalist assumptions. Here, lushly beautiful scenarios function as double-edged critical tools, inhabiting the discourse that they critique.

Jennifer, Where Are You?

Leslie Thornton

1981, 11 min, color, sound, 16 mm film on video

At once charming and disconcerting, Jennifer, Where Are You? depicts a young girl as she sloppily applies lipstick to her face while an unseen male figure calls out her name in search of her. While "Jennifer" hides in plain sight before our eyes, applying her makeup with alternating expressions of glee and melancholy, Thornton presents a carefully structured comment on the formation of young female identity.

Let Me Count the Ways: Minus 6

Leslie Thornton

2006, 2 min, b&w, sound

Writes Thornton: "I am interested in the parallels between the calculated use of the media by Hitler, his theatrical training, and the cynical deployment of the mass media in waging present day politics and warfare. The image of Hitler is always horrifying. Observing him rehearse his dramatics for the camera is chilling because we know that is what is happening today."

Photography is Easy

Leslie Thornton

2006, 4:30 min, color, sound

Thornton continues her investigation of the production of meaning through media. Thornton and a companion are seen hiking through a desert, photographing and recording the journey. Shots of desert landscapes are overlaid with the artist's running commentary and text, as she investigates the porous boundaries between the still and the moving image.

Sahara/Mojave

Leslie Thornton

2006, 12 min, color, sound

Thornton describes Sahara/Mojave as a "little trip to Hollywood via North Africa, circa 1900. I hone an 'aesthetics of uncertainty' to question our understanding of the real." She pairs disparate media sources - a collection of vintage erotic North African postcards and video footage from Universal City, Los Angeles - and a dense audio collage to create an elliptical inquiry into culture, history and representation.

X-TRACTS

Leslie Thornton

1975, 8:30 min, b&w, sound, 16 mm film on video

Thornton's first 16mm film, X-Tracts was made in collaboration with cinematographer Desmond Horsfield. The film consists of complex and rapid patterning of sound/image segments that are structured by a formal mathematical schema that determines duration, interaction, and progression. Moving...