TitleSummer, or Grief with text from A Conversation by Allen Grossman
Artist
Mary Lucier
(American, b. 1944)
Date1998, reworked 2018
MediumSingle-channel video installation
Color, sound. Original format, 4:3 screen ratio
DimensionsRun time: 8 minutes
SubmissionNA diploma presentation, March 4, 2019
Credit LineNational Academy of Design, New York, NY
Object number2019.3
Label TextAs the artist stated: Summer, or Grief is a single-channel video work in which a sequence of personal, light-filled images alternate with single words and short phrases in a stark white font against black background. The imagery consists of stills, pans, tracking shots, and long pulls-to-focus of everyday subjects photographed in and around the artist’s country home in upstate New York over the course of several summers. The text, an excerpt from The Conversation by poet Allen Grossman, is an eloquent but dark meditation on loss and the passage of time. The work is about appearance and interiority, surface and undercurrent, the coexistence of the dark in the light, and apprehension and beauty in common experience. 
