Video

Mr. Green: An Archive of 39 Documents, With Commentary

Steve Reinke

1996, English

TAPECODE 345.112

Mr. Green assembles 39 documents-letters, photographs, lists, receipts - found discarded in a Goodwill filing cabinet. The contents of the documents cover four decades in the adult life of Herbert A. Green, who lived in Toronto and worked in an ink factory. The various items trace a narrative that include the death of Herbert's father, his own struggle to avoid conscription, years living at home with his mother and his eventual marriage, and life after her death. Though, taken as a whole, the document sketches only the basic facts of a life, each item provides a remarkably clear set of details.
Attached to each of the documents is a commentary in QuickTime video with narration. These commentaries form a running dialogue which plays with the process of imagining the life of Mr.Green.

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