The Unobserved World
August 28, 2009
Screening: 6:32pm - 6:47pm
Reception: 6pm - 8pm

The Hunt Gallery is pleased to present, The Unobserved World, an exhibition where the gallery will function as a laboratory for an experiment that will ultimately bring together elements of documentation, performance, and video while pushing curatorial boundaries. The Unobserved World poses the age-old question to its potential audience: If a tree falls in a forest, and there is no one there to hear it, does it make a sound?

This philosophical riddle raises questions regarding observation and knowledge of reality. The skeptic might conclude that: “one can’t be certain of anything until it is perceived or that the tree doesn’t exist at all unless someone is looking at it.” This particular stance has inspired this project’s concept and symbolizes the ineffectiveness of perceived unheard opinions or thoughts or in this case, an unseen art exhibition. This idea also alludes to the writings of George Berkeley, whom in the 18th century developed the concept of subjective idealism, coining the phrase: “to be is to be perceived.” He continues with: "A truly unobserved event is one which realizes no effect on any other it therefore can have no legacy in the present or ongoing wider physical universe. It may then be recognized that the unobserved event was absolutely identical to an event which did not occur at all."

By way of limitation and documentation, The Unobserved World will either answer the commonsense answer as “yes, it did happen and there were a few people there to see it!” or prove the metaphysical answer as “no, because I didn’t go to the Hunt Gallery to witness the tree falling, so therefore it doesn’t exist!” This project also hopes to create a conceptual vibration by poking fun at the possibility of its unperceived existence; it is not the absence of “artwork,” the sound of a tree crashing to the ground or the taste of cold beer that should be considered, but rather the absence of awareness of objects and personal physical perception of these events.

Continuing on this theme, the Scottish philosopher David Hume introduced the idea of Causation and Inductive Inference, on this he wrote: “Causes and effects are discovered, not by reason but through experience, when we find that particular objects are constantly conjoined with one another…we realize that an (absolutely) inexperienced reasoner could be no reasoner at all.” With this in mind, the second part of The Unobserved World physically illustrates this idea. The film recorded during the course of the project will generate a new video using only the imagery from the viewers and their reaction to what they have witnessed, which is to specifically highlight the ephemeral nature of performance and event and the sound it makes through observation, participation and experience.

Video by Robert Goetz, Daniel McGrath and Sherman S. Sherman,
The Induction Problem/Tree Logic, 2009.

syllabus:video series










Alex Gene Morrison
August 28 - September 25, 2009