Specimens is a 3-channel video installation that reinterprets and reclaims disabled movement and highlights the medical and therefore dehumanizing lens that bodies deemed “different” are so often viewed through. The work consists of 3 iPads in shadow boxes, fabricated to look like zoological specimen samples. Each iPad plays an AI-assisted rotoscope animation of physically disabled movement on a loop. The first video shows vignettes of everyday disabled movement, for example, how a disabled person hops or sits. The second and center iPad is a longer movement sequence featuring a choreography of fluid and more halting movements. The third iPad features close-ups of the figure, intended to reference the dissection and over-analyzation of the scientific specimen, and the medicalization of the disabled body. The choice of animation, referencing vintage silent movies but preserving the AI’s glitches, inserts disability into a cultural record where it’s often been ignored. Together, the piece subverts the idealization of smooth, even motion in animation and human movement.
The creation of a second iteration of this work was made possible thanks to funding from the Conseil des arts de Montréal. Updates to come.
Emery Vanderburgh 