Long Play: Bruce Conner and the Singles Collection May 21, 2010

In Bruce Conner's electric 'Three Screen Ray' (2006), a new acquisition premiering in this exhibition, Ray Charles's 1959 hit song 'What'd I Say' is set to an ecstatic, frenzied collage -- nude women, bomb explosions, fireworks -- of original and preexisting imagery. A tour de force of experimental film techniques, the piece features Conner's manipulations of the film surface and his signature use of countdown leader. The work's central image is Conner's 1961 film 'Cosmic Ray,' which he adapted to three screens in 1965 and later reedited to create this gallery installation of three video projections. A rotating series of "singles," or single-channel video works from the SFMOMA collection, is presented in an adjoining gallery.