A long time ago I bought one of those silly books, the kind that goes over a topic generally in order to introduce the given concept. It was called "video art". Through it I discovered this installation by artist Doug Aitken, an eight-channel moving image projected onto the outside of MOMA in 2007, and featuring Tilda Swinton, Donald Sutherland, Chan Marshall, Seu Jorge, and Ryan Donowho. I never moved much beyond this in the book, which has laid closed on my shelf for the past year at least...but I'm not bothered. Sleepwalkers is the most expressive and graceful installation I think I have ever come across.

A bit from the MOMA website: "This nighttime installation comprises eight large-scale moving images projected around the museum and on its facades, enlivening the architecture with the nocturnal journeys of five city inhabitants...These characters provide a blueprint for the metropolis as a living, breathing organism fueled by the desires, energies, and ambitions of its inhabitants.

Sleepwalkers is a broken narrative, without beginning or end. The five characters entwine across the building's surfaces in combinations that change cyclically throughout the course of each evening. With this exhibition Aitken pioneers a site-specific cinema, expanded into the urban landscape and keyed to the pedestrian experience."

What do you guys think?

visit the website
a review in new york magazine

- jess