Rift of the Pandimensional Under-Gods

Mattress Factory Museum, Performance/Music Video, 2008

Collaboration with Ben Kinsley

THE RIFT OF THE PANDIMENSIONAL UNDER-GODS: COLOSSUS MEETS ANGARON was a two-part project that brought together a medieval battle society (Angaron) with a fantasy metal band (Colossus). 

Part one of this project consisted of a live performance, in front of the Mattress Factory Museum during opening night, in which Angaron is summoned forth from a parked Uhaul truck to fight to the live music of Colossus who happens to be performing in an adjacent truck. This 3 hour performance was presented using the conceptual and organizational structure of a music video shoot; complete with props, multiple camera operators, theatrical lighting, smoke machines, traffic controlling police officers and the start and stop direction found in commercial video production.

Part two of the project consisted of the screening and selling of the resulting music video in the museums gift shop as well as the distribution of dvd copies by Colossus and Angaron for self-promotional purposes.

The project first utilizes the utopian and objectifying structures of the art and music video worlds to amplify the inherent fantasies of a DIY medieval battle society and a young fantasy metal band. The unlikely collaboration forged through the project highlights the loosely defined and self-serving mythologies that everyone involved is working under (including the artists) and addresses a particularly male cultural obsession with violent fictional worlds and heroic fictional selves. The resultant music video is not exhibited in the museums galleries, but placed directly for sale in the gift shop, returning the fantasy to the commercial sphere where it can exist as a purely promotional product.

ANGARON

Angaron is a full contact medieval combat organization in the Pittsburgh Pennsylvania area in which participants assume the role of a persona that could have lived in pre-firearms history or fantasy, dress in the period and culture's clothing and meet on the battlefield for combat.

COLOSSUS

A wonder of the ancient world, the COLOSSUS was constructed out of a single slab of marble and erected over the harbor in Rhodes. Alas, all things mighty must tumble, and one day the COLOSSUS shattered into five pieces and sunk to the ocean floor. Legend has it that Poseidon recovered the five fragments, raised them out of the water, and gave each one life and special powers. To this day they are slaves to Poseidon and must do his bidding as he commands them to rock your bars, drink your beer, and crush your skulls with thundering beats, baroque polyphony, galloping basses, and soaring vocals. They currently reside in Raleigh, North Carolina.

BAND MEMEBERS: Benjamin Smith-Drums Bill Fisher- Guitar. Rylan Wilshire- Bass. Sean Buchanan- Vox. Nicky Nixon- Guitar. Andy Lewis- Guitar.

PHOTOGRAPHY:

Chris Beauregard / Greg Witt

CINEMATOGRAPHY:

Ben Bigelow / Joey Hayes / Spencer Longo / Michael Pisano

SPECIAL THANKS:

Lauren Adams / Jake Peterson / Owen Smith

ANGARON: www.angaron.org

COLOSSUS: www.myspace.com/thecolossuswillcrushyou