Impediment

Co-Artist:
edited: Charlotte Wall and Sharon Klahanoff
A poignant and personal look at the late stage of life, Impediment is a video installation that looks at the barriers - both the emotional and the physical - to human connection with others, to lucidity and to one’s own “self”. The viewer observes the sparks of recognition, remembrance and humour that break through the surface of the old man’s thought patterns.
The subject is a 93 year old man, still lucid, seemingly anonymous and sublimely fragile. He is in a care home as nurses, caretakers and residents shuffle by. While reminiscing, he starts to sing a song from his youth.
Project Year
2001
Materials
video installation
Location
Vancouver, BC Canada
Project Status
Completed
The installation uses two projected images on one wall. The video of the man is at eye-level and measures 5’x5’. A second image, measuring 2’x5’, is projected onto a platform underneath the main image, displaying sounds and sights of deformed feet shuffling - the ding of a walker, the squeak of a wheelchair.
“While he was singing the song he started playing with his wedding ring. His knuckle was big, he couldn’t quite get it off and then finally it came off. When he tried to put it back on, it was on the wrong finger but eventually he found the right finger and put it back on.”