Program Note:

In the Vietnamese language, ‘to miss someone’ and ‘to remember someone’ are compartmentalized into one word: nhớ. For example, if my aunt from Vietnam asked me, “Con có nhớ cô không?,” that could be interpreted as both “Do you miss me?” or “Do you remember me?” in English. That begs the question: am I missing someone more than I actually remember them? Perhaps they are one in the same. Memory can be volatile, and the feeling of nostalgia can often overpower the actual memory. Is the feeling more important than the event itself? We record and document life events via video or photography to hold on to these precious moments. We even share these memories to millions of strangers on the internets. There is a strange, yet familiar, intimacy in this footage, even though we have not experienced the episode for ourselves. Commissioned by saxophonist Leo Schlaifer, (miss)remember explores these concepts and questions with video by artist Ian O’Neill. Stock and found home footage is manipulated using techniques such as data moshing to create a faded memory that invites viewers into these private moments.