Dara Birnbaum Reconstructs Television Imagery

Dara Birnbaum initially studied architecture and town planning. Later she switched to studying painting at the San Francisco Art Institute.

In the late 1970’s Birnbaum began her video art career after she returned to New York and continued her education at the New School of Social Research, where she focused on video art.

Primarily Dara Birnbaum’s production consists of video art and installations. Variations of her videos from the late 1970’s and early 1980’s are of the same theme, all reinterpreting the various formats and “language” of television utilizing different techniques.

“Technology/Transformation: Wonder Woman” (1978-1979) is a prominent piece of video art by Birnbaum. She utilizes suitable images of Wonder Woman to overturn the ideology and meaning embedded in this television series.

A large three-part video and installation Birnbaum began in the mid 1980’s is based on the myth of Faust. This series is titled, “Damnation of Faust: Evocation” (1983), “Damnation of Faust: Will-O’-the-Wisp” (1985) and “Damnation of Faust: Charming Landscape” (1987).  In this series Birnbaum closely examines the myth of femininity through personal and social experiences.

Birnbaum completed a public art wall project commissioned and designed for an Atlanta, GA shopping mall in 1989. This installation is titled “Rio Videowall” and is comprised of 25 monitors; it is a large-scale interactive installation.

The installation titled, “Tiananmen Square: Break-In Transmission” (1990) created by Birnbaum concentrates on the events surrounding the broadcasting of the students and worker uprising in the summer of 1989. One of the installation’s video channels focuses on the moment CBS and CNN were forced to stop broadcast transmission, while another channel broadcasts the ways and means taken up by students to continue to get images out.

“Transmission Tower: Sentinel” (1992) Dara Brinbuam closes in on the excerpts from the famous, “Thousand Points of Light” speech made by George Bush, when he accepted the Republican party’s nomination to run for President in 1988.

The 1977 kidnapping of Hanns-Martin Schleyer is the subject of Birnbaum’s 1994 six-channel video installation titled, “Hostage”.

Birnbaum’s video art has been viewed in countless festivals, video art exhibitions and events throughout the world.

To date Dara Birnbaum continues to live and work in New York where she reconstructs television imagery using archetypal formats such as quiz shows, soap operas and sports programs. Her techniques involve repetition of images and interruption of flow with text and music. Birnbaum is also well known for forming part of the feminist art movement.


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Dara Birnbaum: Dark Matter of Media Light