At times, works in video, music or other arts may also push beyond the edge
Cunningham is balancing. They may radically transcend the limits of human
perception. Rather than challenging the capabilities of our perception and bal-
ancing on the edge of the possible, they may, in a sense, leave their anchoring in
human-embodied perception and instead make themselves available on a con-
ceptual level.But, in this case, James and Cunningham do not wish to leave
the human scale, but rather push it to its limits. Therefore, they operate at, and
slightly beyond, the threshold of human perception, but without leaving it alto-
gether.
The Forms Afforded by Temporal Mutability
Street SpiritandThe Rise and Fallinaugurate, in their wildly different
ways, worlds of hybrid temporality where bodies are miraculously accelerated
and de-accelerated independently of each other while mysteriously sharing the
same space.Only Youarticulates an intimately controlled universe, where the
speed of the bodies isdanced, as if from an immensely sensible and musical
master puppeteer, whileRubber Johnnydisplays a more action/reaction-or-
iented synchronicity where the controlling agency is more dispersed. The ecol-
ogy of the musical groove, together with the visuals, allows questions of origin-
ary agency to fade into the background in favor of a circulation of energies and
impulses that seem as much human as machinic, as emanating from the“shape-
shifting”plasma in play. This cyborg dimension, where the machinic and the
organic are fused in a new dynamism–albeit here ironically charged with the
abject deformities defining Johnny–can also be traced back to some of the in-
spirations behind Benjamin’s questioning of the relation between art and tech-
nology, in particular to Dziga Vertov. In one of his early manifestos, Vertov de-
scribes how the human is transformed and engulfed by technology, in this case,
the cinematographic apparatus:
I am kino-eye. I am mechanical eye. I, a machine....Now and forever I free myself
from human immobility, I am in constant motion.... My path leads to the creation of
a fresh perception of the world. I decipher in a new way a world unknown to you.In Vertov’s vision, as well as in Cunningham’s, an interrogation of and change
in perceptual forms are pivotal. The human becomes machine-like, liberated
from human mobility or lack thereof, finding new dynamism in a merging with
the machine, with technology. This merger yields a new and fresh perception of
the world.
Mutable Temporality In and Beyond the Music Video 177