Edition I · Recirculation
Video compilation on VHS · Source films: 1987–1998
Video compilation on VHS · Source films: 1987–1998
What becomes visible when a corporate future is encountered as an artefact of the past?
Back to the Futures brings together corporate visions of homes, workplaces and communications systems from the 1980s and 1990s, dubbed onto a Back to the Future VHS tape. The compilation invites viewers to compare the futures technology companies promised with the worlds that followed.
The VHS transfer made the medium itself part of the commentary. Image noise and loss of detail made the promises visibly age, while the increasingly awkward task of playback exposed the recording technology’s own obsolescence. As the tape circulated and its images returned to computer screens, preservation and replay changed how those futures were encountered.
Julian Bleecker wrote about receiving and watching the tape in Ikky Futures — Back To The Futures on VHS Tape (Near Future Laboratory, 12 August 2009).
The VHS transfer made the medium itself part of the commentary. Image noise and loss of detail made the promises visibly age, while the increasingly awkward task of playback exposed the recording technology’s own obsolescence. As the tape circulated and its images returned to computer screens, preservation and replay changed how those futures were encountered.
Julian Bleecker wrote about receiving and watching the tape in Ikky Futures — Back To The Futures on VHS Tape (Near Future Laboratory, 12 August 2009).
VHS concept film produced by Chris Woebken with Natalie Jeremijenko at the Environmental Health Clinic, New York University.
Developed for Half-inch Half-life, Migrating Forms’ VHS viewing room at No Soul for Sale, X Initiative, New York, June 2009.
Original footage from the corporate films credited below.
1987 Apple, Knowledge Navigator (05:58min)
1988 Apple, Grey Flannel (08:02min)
1990 Motorola, 2000 A.D. (06:23min)
1991 Pacific Bell, Concept Video (08:40min)
1993 AT&T, Connections: AT&T’s Vision of the Future (14:12min)
1993 Sun, Starfire (15:42min)
1996 Philips, Vision of the Future (13:27min)
1998 NEC, New Ways of Communicating (02:43min)
Exhibitions & related material
Exhibitions & public programs
- No Soul for Sale — Half-inch Half-lifeX Initiative, New York, June 2009. Edition I was developed for Migrating Forms’ VHS viewing room.
Articles, publications & talks
- Ikky Futures — Back To The Futures on VHS TapeJulian Bleecker on receiving and watching the original VHS edition.
- Back to the Futures IICommissioned by Karen Verschooren for Future Fictions at Z33, Hasselt.