THIS IS BEING BLACK, THIS IS BEING WHITE
(Video, 2.5 Min)
SPACE
DESCRIPTION
This video was originally captured on Super 8 cartridge film. The cartridges are included in their entirety.

STATEMENT
Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914) established a triadic theory of sign where the Representamen (the signifier), relates to both the Interpretant (the signified) and the Object (the referent). Peirce added that the Object can be an Immediate Object, the object as it is represented by the sign, or a Dynamic Object, the actual object independent of the sign. THIS IS BEING BLACK, THIS IS BEING WHITE questions the existence of a Black or White racial identity, or the "Dynamic Object" of the sign. (Does “Blackness” or "Whiteness” exist independently of the sign or only as Immediate Object?) The Representamen, a moving image of a Black or White individual or the living individuals themselves, leads to the creation of an Interpretant or Immediate Object, the concept or further sign of a Black or White identity type, but can not point to a racial identity or "Blackness/Whiteness".