Commune: (1) to communicate intensely. (2)
The smallest community unit in many European countries.
In Commune, a grid of nine people
communicates with the viewer non-verbally while interacting with others via
their smartphones. They are at once
together yet separate, intense but removed, expressive yet occluded, connected
to us and to the unseen people they interact with, yet also separated by the
same technologies (video and smartphones) that facilitate this
communication. Their arrangement
and body language, as their collective gaze focuses downward to the texts they
read while also projecting their thoughts into the ether, is reminiscent of a
church choir with their hymnals.
