Reviewed: July 15

Big Tools/Small Tools combines inexpensive miniature video cameras and monitors with a large, custom-crafted camera-obscura lens.

The lens projects an image of an area just outside the gallery onto an interior wall. This is layered over five small LCD monitors, which also show live images of the street. Over the day, the image from the obscura lens grows brighter then darker in tune with the daylight outside, whereas the monitor images remain fairly stable, albeit not sharp.

The heart of the installation is the conflation of these imaging systems - white light versus pixels, and analogue versus digital - and their live representations.

Big Tools can be seen as an interrogation of how certain imaging tools build the world for our eyes and the problems these systems create. It also suggests that old and new media may present us with less-than-agreeable versions of reality. Unfortunately, the opening was at night, so the lens image was dark, making the project incomplete. Like encountering images of yourself in a video store monitor, the live feeds initially are intriguing. But, as that wears off, the project's real-time, site-specific limitations reveal a lack of concern with what's actually being seen and why. The work seems unable to move beyond, or refer to anything outside its own context and circular structure.

Overall, the apparatus-oriented approach elegantly questions lens-based imaging systems and their effect on the way we see the world. Even with its limitations, it's worth a visit ... during the day.