Balboa Ellipsis,  2011, 2-channel HD Video

Balboa Ellipsis is a two-channel video tracing the ascendance and dominance of the Navy in San Diego through the history of the city’s Balboa Park. Two simultaneous projections arranged at a 90 degree angle juxtapose the project's source materials and its subject: On one screen, a researcher sorts through an array of photographs, news clippings and microfilm related to Balboa Park’s history. On the other, a camera hovers through the topography, historical remnants and tourist processions of the contemporary park. Various voices read historical reports from Balboa’s history--from its former life as a naval hospital and training ground, up to an episode from the present day in which a marine formerly stationed at the Park’s Naval Hospital is killed in Afghanistan by “friendly fire” from a locally manufactured predator drone. Appearing, interleaved into this bifurcated movement, on both screens, are segments alternately documenting the fanfare of a naval aviation demonstration in San Diego harbor and the somber regimentation of a public military wake.