I attended the Omer Fast exhibition at the James Cohan gallery. The exhibition features three short films by artist, Omer Fast. These three films are entitled 5,000 Feet is the Best (2011), Continuity (2012), and Spring (2016). Each one is professionally produced with competent acting and great cinematography.  During the installation I found myself contemplating whether or not the films should be considered experimental or not.  Ultimately I came to the conclusion that indeed they can be considered experimental art. This is due to the fact that despite possessing a narrative structure, Fast is still conscious of the exhibition space and places an emphasis on evoking feeling as opposed to telling a story.

The first film, 5,000 Feet is the Best, deals with issues of drone surveillance and aims to bring drone warfare closer to home. The film is able to do this especially well by using aerial shots of suburban neighborhoods while overlaying these visuals with audio of drone pilots describing what it is like to observe targets from the sky. The key sequence of this film is an interview between a journalist and a drone pilot, which is used as a vehicle to tell a series of vignettes which are loosely connected to the rest of the film. This interview sequence is repeated throughout the film from differing camera angles, some of which expose the camera crew filming the interview.

The second film, Spring, is displayed across 5 separate screens arranged both vertically and horizontally in order to create one large screen. This arrangement compliments the disappearing images, overlapping scenes, sounds, and shots featured in the film. There is a theme of connected yet disjointed narrative throughout this exhibition and the physical arrangement of the displays compliments this theme.

The third film, Continuity, follows a soldier returning home to his parents. The soldier recounts stories of war for his parents. These stories materialize inside the suburban home through the use of overlapping visuals which appear almost ghostly. Again, Fast uses repetition of scenes, places and lack of a linear story to keep the audience guessing and evoke a feeling of being in an absurd world. The world that Fast creates is visually similar to our own but the circumstances and occurrences that take place in this world evoke a discomfort that makes us aware of the fact that the environments of the films are almost otherworldly.

All three films are played on a loop in separate exhibition spaces. This means that the viewer can start watching each film at any point and the story will still unfold properly with varying emotional impact. This is due to the fact that the same scenes are repeated throughout each film from varying camera angles and the major plot points in each film overlap with one another and are replayed periodically. By arranging these films in a gallery space on a loop, Fast is able to create a piece of slightly absurdist art. The viewer feels as if they are watching a spectacle rather than a narrative film.