17" x 22" Screenprint / Digital Print, Still from Video

LETTERS IN A COMA 2004 Digital Video 5:25min > Project Notes

An empathetic response to trauma, Letters in a Coma is a video animation of solitary tic tac toe drawings, played by Jennifer Schmidt while experiencing a loved one in a coma. Through the process of playing the child-like game over and over and making simple decisions framed by a known outcome, the artist attempts to transfer and translate personal feelings of loss and remission onto a projected medium using graphic symbolism as a means to aesthetically and conceptually reference the color coded computer interface of an Intensive Care Unit vital signs monitor.

The x's and o's, lined with pink and yellow highlighter, shift and fade to the rhythm of a respirator. Like a sampler stitch, they methodically record sentiments and thoughts with care-- on a white sheet, while two folk motif birds look-on as fixed, unmoving observers.

Solitaire Tic Tac Toe: played and highlighted by Jennifer Schmidt
Video Animation of Tic Tac Toe Drawings: Jennifer Schmidt
Audio by L.Contra
For Mandy