Global Groove
Combining innovative video techniques (including colorization, video feedback, and magnetic scan modulation) with radical editing, Global Groove imagines channel surfing on a television from the future. A collaboration between artist Nam June Paik and John Godfrey (head engineer for WNET, New York City’s public television station in the 1970s), the video presents a colorful collage of clips including a diverse group of musicians and dancers intercut with commercial footage and previous video work by Paik. In addition to appearances by Allen Ginsberg, Merce Cunningham, and John Cage, Charlotte Moorman plays the TV Cello in an increasingly frenetic frolic through Paik’s conjured global programming. Paik advocated for television as a democratic medium free from paywalls and nationalist barriers, and his seminal video stands in stark contrast to the reality of contemporary broadcasting.
Artwork Details
- Title: Global Groove
- Artist: Nam June Paik (American (born Korea), Seoul 1932–2006 Miami, Florida)
- Artist: in collaboration with John Godfrey (American, born 1942)
- Date: 1973
- Medium: Single-channel digital video, transferred from video tape, color, sound; 28 min., 30 sec.
- Classification: Variable Media
- Credit Line: Purchase, Henry Nias Foundation Inc. Gift, 2023
- Object Number: 2023.20
- Curatorial Department: Photographs
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Multiple artists/makers
1984
Nam June Paik
2005
David Hammons
1995/1999
Sadie Benning
1990
Ilene Segalove
1974–78
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