Derek Jarman‘s ‘Blue’ (1993)
Blue is Jarman’s final feature film, released four months before his death from AIDS-related complications. The disease had already rendered him partially blind at the time of the film’s release.
The film was his last testament as a film-maker, and consists of a single shot of saturated blue colour filling the screen, as background to a soundtrack where Jarman’s and some of his favourite actors’ narration describes his life and vision.
‘World Community Grid Water Features’ by AIDS-3D
A group of spectacular cast-fiberglass fountains stand together on an elevated server-room floor. A Fit PC 2 (the smallest PC currently available, 96% more energy efficient than a standard desktop) is installed in each water feature. Whenever the fountains are plugged in, the Linux PC’s will automatically boot up and run World Community Grid software, a distributed computing project which uses a massive network of PC’s around the world to model solutions for various humanitarian problems, such as: “Clean Energy Project”, “Influenza Antiviral Drug Search”, “ Fight Aids@home” and “Nutritious Rice for the World”. The delightful splashing of the water and twinkle of the energy-efficient LED’s act as relaxing and meditative status-light for the computers, tirelessly laboring within. Although there is no screen visible in the installation, the computation progress can be remotely monitored through a dedicated website.
‘Shut the fuck up’ part I (Death of a Mauve Bat) & part II (Mondo Cane)
‘Shut the fuck up’ part III (Blue) by General Idea.
General Idea was a collective of three artists, Felix Partz, Jorge Zontal and AA Bronson, that existed from 1969 – 1994. General Idea’s work inhabited and subverted forms of popular and media culture, including beauty pageants, boutiques, television talk shows, trade fair pavilions and mass media. From 1987 through 1994 their work addressed the AIDS crisis. Both Zontal and Partz died of AIDS in 1994.
(via De Ondergrond)
