7:10pm: Arrive in the heart of Bushwick (off the Jefferson stop) to meet up with Arias to go to something she described as a “video/sound thing at Microscope Gallery.” That’s all she had to say and I was sold! Video AND sound? Shut the front door. How could I not go?

Truthfully, I had no other plans and I love Arias. I usually enjoy the things she invites me to, because they are things I wouldn’t have found myself. Punk rock karaoke anyone? Free vegan meal and showing of a rando documentary from 1984 about Williamsburg? She expands my consciousness. She works at Silent Barn and used to work for MoMA P.S. 1 and has been involved with the New York scene for several years.

7:15pm: The room for the show is just a big white room with white folding chairs and about 5 film projectors set up in the middle of the room. The audience is a mostly older crowd. Everyone looks thoroughly artsy though. I think one person might have been actually wearing a beret.

7:30pm: The show begins with an introduction from someone from the gallery. She explains that this is part of their “Never Twice” series. A series devoted to “live moving image performance in the context of what is usually referred to as expanded cinema.” She then invites up the first performer/artist – Andrew Lambert. Andrew Lambert is wearing the typical – casual wrinkled button up and trousers “film dude” uniform – clothes that look like they could have been bought at Urban Outfitters. In my experience artists either look super nice or they look like super grungy. Either they use their appearance as an extension of their good taste or they wear crap because they “don’t care” and don’t have time to dress because they devote all their time to their art. Either way the look is a conscious decision by the artist. Don’t pretend that your look isn’t curated.

So Andrew goes on about how he got SO bored with expanded cinema that he started experimenting with “contracted cinema.” A term he made up which means … I will never know because I would never go see his work again after tonight.

This is the only contracted cinema I want to watch

His first piece is just a projection of generic landscape shots of the southwest with a Neil Young song playing. The “expanded” element is that he and two other people are playing the same video on a slight delay on their iPhone as they walk in front of the projection. I think in theory this could have been moderately interesting if the subject matter was interesting or if the iPhones were playing something different but since the subject matter was boring it was boring. Also Andrew like contorted his body so he could be against the wall and lower. He looked ridiculous. The whole performance looked like a trope. Like as if we were in a Wes Anderson film that was making fun of expanded cinema.

Andrew’s second piece was “a Christmas piece.” He played terrible Christmas music on a poorly tuned electric guitar as two helpers used green and red gels to make red and green shapes on the walls. The helpers moved the gels around to make different shapes. The lights were very harsh and also since the projectors were slightly broken they were blinking very quickly almost like a super fast strobe light. That blinking paired with the god-awful guitar playing made me nauseous. To be fair, art is supposed to make you feel something and I felt ill. Once Andrew was done paying awful guitar he went up to the where the light was projecting and hung up corny Christmas decoration on the wall. He then held up the Bing Crosby Christmas album on vinyl and LET IT DROP TO THE GROUND, which to me was the most offensive part of the piece. That is a good album sir- much better than your self-involved shitty art performance.

This man is an American treasure!

8:00pm: Intermission. Arias’ friend Alex turns to his friend Asa and apologizes for taking us here. It’s fine Alex, you didn’t know!

8:10pm: The second artist begins - Rose Kallal. She doesn’t have a long soliloquy before his performance. She just quickly introduced it and begins. Her piece is 4 short film loops projected against the wall while she scores a music piece live with a modular synth. I like this piece better. The images are very pretty and a tad mezmorizing as they loop. The score adds something to the mood of the images which change with the tone of the sound. However, the piece is too long. The loops are only about 20-30 seconds each and the piece lasts for what feels like an eternity. Towards the middle my thoughts wandered to other things, my tasks for tomorrow and where to eat dinner. Then after thinking about that for several minutes my thoughts just turned to “when will this be over?” “Can this be over?” “stop” “BE OVER.” I was basically trying to will her to stop. It was so long people like got up to go to the bathroom. When people can’t hold it that’s TOO LONG.

8:30pm: A discussion begins about the pieces. Andrew, the artist, is one of the least articulate most insipid people I have heard speak in recent years. Some of his gems include: “I’m really excited by working with broken projectors” and “Your phone is the biggest source of expanded cinema because they have the interent” and it’s like… yes we are aware that our phones have the Internet...

Now, I am open minded. I go to things like this fairly often and have an appreciation for contemporary art and performance. But some of the art and the performances are just terrible bullshit. It’s like how some techno is transcended bliss and some just sounds like a car alarm. So it may sound like I am ragging on expanded cinema but really I just thought these performances were terrible and fine, respectively, .

8:40pm: To confirm my opinion, the OG avant-garde filmmaker, Jonas Mekas who was sitting in the back of the room just entered the conversation. The gallery is showing his 365 day project where he decided to film every day of his life in 2007. Jonas Mekas is 92 and he says what everyone is thinking. He started verbally assaulting Andrew Lambert’s work and says there was nothing “expanded” about his cinema. He then goes on to also say that the second piece could “maybe” be considered expanded cinema or experimental - if it took place in the 1960s. BAM! Slaying me. I love this man. PRAISE JONAS MEKAS. I want to be a super famous 92 years old on panels dismissing the young folk who are minimizing the field I helped to expand and create.

Watch the video below, part of Jonas Mekas 365 day project, and tell me you don't love Jonas Mekas.

8:45pm: Then Andrew asks if a little girl, about age 4 or 5, who I am assuming is his daughter, can sing to us. She asked to sing to us. Everyone agrees. She goes up to the front of the room and stands there for a minute hesitating. She then just lets out one loud cry and runs away. And there you have it – avant garde singing folks. She’s already a performance artist that one.