Auld Lang Syne 2008
2008.01.01
Type
Installation
Keywords
time, clock, new year's
Entities
Showing
The Tranzac, Toronto, New Year's Eve, 2007
Similar to our installation of the same name the year before, our attempt was to create a New Year's Eve experience unlike any other.
At the Tranzac club in Toronto, a rotary-like clock was projected above the bands performing that evening. Everpresent in the audience's mind was the clock, the symbol of why they were there. As the clock reached 11:59:00, it at first sped up and then began to slow down. The display hung at 11:59:59, remaining there for the rest of the night. I think some people were upset.
Aside from deriving some pleasure in screwing with people's expectations for the evening, I found the experience to be different than what I'd expected. New Year's celebrations are one of the biggest let-downs in the history of parties. Once the anticipation of midnight is gone, the feeling is "let's have another drink and then go home," the point of being there having come and gone.
What I found was that by delaying the stroke of midnight, the sense was the the revelry could go on just a little bit longer, even though we knew that it was fake.
