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SHADOW (FOR HEISENBERG) Shadow (For Heisenberg), 1993-94Custom electronics, video camera, glass cube with LCD material, statue Shadow (for Heisenberg) is an interactive installation that involves the viewer's desire to see an object contained within a glass cube. If the viewer moves towards the object the image of the object fades from view and is replaced by the shadow of the object. This work incorporates a new technology that allows a piece of glass to go from transparent to translucent. The work also incorporates a video camera on the ceiling. The image from the camera on the ceiling is manipulated and displayed on the wall behind the pedestal to make apparent the relationship between position and perception. This work is loosely based on the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle from Quantum Physics which states that one can never observe an object in its purest form because the process of observation has an impact on the object. The more accurately one trys to observe or...

Rist: "A lot of people think that I work with more complicated machines than I do, when in fact I work in a very low-tech way that is much more interesting. For example, in the footage of the flying body parts, the hands and feet, people think this is computer animated. It's not true. I did it in my apartment near a window. I put black fabric over things, and wore black clothes (except for those areas of my body), and I lay down and moved my limbs around with the camera twisting in my hand. So it was just sunlight, black fabric, and a consumer camera. I didn't even use a studio light. Then on the computer, of course, I had to correct for different tones of blacks. I also work with surveillance cameras, the small ones. In the projected images here behind the orange sofa, for example, of a woman's reflection on a house, the camera sweeps across the outside of the house. It looks as if I had used a hundred thousand dollar machine. But it's just a long aluminum sti...