Corey Arcangel: Colors

Corey Arcangel is one of the foremost proponents of technology-driven art, appropriating films, video games, and source code as the raw materials of his artistic practice. For Colors, Arcangel takes as source material and medium the 1988 film of the same name directed by Dennis Hopper which explores life on the gang-ridden streets of South Central Los Angeles. Using a slit-scan technique, Arcangel isolates one horizontal row of pixels at a time, stretching them to fill the screen vertically. Each column oscillates on the screen, creating a vibrant field of color that recalls modernist abstraction yet represents the breakdown of cinematic data. The film’s soundtrack plays in real time, countering the abstract visual field and highlighting the tension between analog and digital technologies.