Country Road
Select Random Image Text and Image with Search
Iowa claims the nation's attention once every four years. In the year leading up to Iowa's momentous presidential caucus, candidates crisscross the state showing up at school gymnasiums, county fairs, American Legion posts, coffee shops, universities, pancake breakfasts, and bean suppers.
Maybe because of this unaccustomed attention, Iowa voters take the responsibility of choosing a candidate very seriously. Many meet the candidates face-to-face multiple times, gauging their words, looking into their eyes, and judging whether they have the moral fiber to lead our nation. In pre-caucus Iowa, national politics is brought to our doorstep and turned personal.
In "Country Road," I am trying to not only chronicle the path to the White House as it winds its way through Iowa, but also to capture something a little more elusive. We are a nation of optimists. While national politics could easily convert us to a nation of cynics, the indeterminable essence of our optimism, particularly as it relates to our form of government in effect defines us. It has been the key to our beginnings as a nation as well as to its often flawed evolution.
"Country Road" currently has two parts. In part one, the program chooses a random image from the bank of images I collected over the caucus season. There is no particular order to the progression of images, and the resultant effect is a kind of tapestry of this unique season in Iowa.
The second part of this project juxtaposes a random image selected from the image bank of caucus images, with a sentence randomly selected from a text bank of statements made by the candidates on the stump. Further, this text phrase is sent to a Google search with the results presented alongside the image and text. The text/image/search, when presented in a single frame, produces unanticipated relationships that alter the meanings of both the image and the text. The search results serve simultaneously as an anchoring device, a signifier of temporality, and a device for fracturing our attention. The result is something akin to trying to listen to a symphony orchestra in a busy kitchen, and mirrors the media-saturated environment of our current political landscape.