Nam June Paik

TV, electronic multi-media, video artist, Nam June Paik died on 29 January, 2006. Paik is probably most best remembered for the work he did in the 1960s with the cellist Charlotte Moorman.
But, for yours truly, his TV Garden was one of the highlights of the 1978 retrospective at the Georges Pompidou Centre, Paris.
You entered a very large and enclosed dark room, not knowing what to expect. Once inside, you were shepherded around a gantry walkway that bordered upon a dense mass of tropical foliage amongst which 30 TV sets were installed.
Many of the TV sets were laid flat, their screens facing upwards. Half hidden by the jungle foliage, the electronic images -- in colour, black and white, multitudinous and quick edited -- flickered, with the same reel looped through all the TV sets but not in synchronicity. A soundtrack, for there was a soundtrack, was very atonal, loud, in a New York groove, dance music. Taken together, the ensemble was dark, fetid, fast and furious. Puzzling? Yes. What did it mean? What does Van Gogh's A Starry Night mean?
Beauty, they say, is in the eye of the beholder. For this beholder, Paik's TV Garden has puzzled and pleased ever since. To do both is no mean feat. Nam June Paik, here and here.