Riotous and multi-layered, Ryan Trecartin's ambitious videos update moving-image practice for the Internet age. His fast-growing body of work explores the impulses and attitudes of a generation whose self-perceptions and relationships are deeply tied to media. Often structured like iChat dialogues, Trecartin’s narratives ricochet between characters and actions, gleaning information and enacting existential dramas at hyper-speed. His characters, all constructed collaboratively with his actors, include independent avatars, people composites, culture collectors, and cyber queers—all twisted and true emblems of what the artist calls “a potential part-cyber today.”

This conversation between Trecartin and Lauren Cornell, Director of Rhizome, featured short videos and excerpts from A Family Finds Entertainment (2004) and I-Be AREA (2007).

Ryan Trecartin lives and works in Philadelphia. He has had solo exhibitions at Elizabeth Dee Gallery, New York; Crane Arts, Philadelphia; and QED, Los Angeles.

A screening of I-Be AREA took place on December 8. See that date for details.