Juke

Jefferson Pinder, who earned his MFA in video and performance art at the University of Maryland in 2003 and taught in the Department of Art for nearly a decade, is interested in the interaction between artwork and viewer. His video installation Juke comprises ten videos, two of which play on each monitor in the present installation. In each, a camera focuses on a black person’s face framed against a bright white background. The subjects—including the artist and nine other Washingtonians—lip-synch songs by white musicians, from country singers Loretta Lynn and Johnny Cash to rockers David Bowie and Patti Smith. Performances are heartfelt and visceral. Pinder elaborates: “There are hundreds (if not thousands) of unspoken rules of engagement in this never ending fight [against] racism in the United States. Popular music has been a dynamic changing battleground. Music has always been segregated. Juke is a musical installation that wrestles with serious issues in the most unfamiliar way. Can music be either black or white? Can song be used as an instrument to provoke a conversation about race?” As Juke makes evident, “the lyrics that these performers are singing relate to the black experience—all of them.”

Jefferson Pinder

2006

Courtesy of the artist

Digital videos. Edition 5 of 10.

Installed: 28 x 108 inches.