SIMULATION BEACH (Installation), 2014, 4 channels; 16mm transferred to HD, color, directional sound, runtime of all films approx. 13 min.
The first iteration of SIMULATION BEACH is an installation of four 16mm films transferred to video that explores the culture of risk and simulation in the La Jolla/San Diego region--a place branded by its business interests as “Biotech Beach.” In this idyllic but fragile landscape scientists and emergency managers model, assess, and sometimes profit from the risks of natural hazards such as fires, earthquakes, weather patterns, and climate change, through simulations and models. Each of the films in the installation focuses on a particular site dedicated to the simulation of one of the four primordial (western) elements:
⋅ Fire: a fire-training center in the county’s “heartland,” El Cajon.
⋅ Water: a hydraulics lab nestled in the Scripps Institution for Oceanography’s beachside campus.
⋅ Air: a downtown weather forecasting startup originating at Scripps.
⋅ Earth: UC San Diego’s inland earthquake simulator at Englekirk Center.
By documenting these primordial forces as they are recreated in controlled settings the films attempt to capture something of the paradox of our intensifying search for control over the elements in an era in which we have recognized ourselves as a geological force.
Ancillary projects:
Prints