The Secretary

The Secretary is an installation and performance that responds to the impact of digital technology on the book. Constructed as a triptych, the work merges installation, performance, video, sound and dimmed lighting to create an ambient atmosphere that evokes a sense of loss for the book in codex form. A ghostlike image of a secretary, engaged in the repetitive task of recording information and wearing glasses with tree-ring lenses, is projected over a giant ellipse created from thousands of book pages that extend from wall to floor. The work addresses the future of the book by looking back to the past. It is also concerned with the surfeit of information, of being completely engulfed and consumed by information while simultaneously attempting to accumulate and prioritise that information. It reflects on the never-ending process of gathering the past into the present, of ordering and managing the constant flow of history.