Hollow Meaning

There is something rather magnificent about carpentry; about making an artifact that has the possibility of meaning something or lasting; about taking what you think or are passionate about and transforming those thoughts into a tangible piece of art/machinery/media.  Ian Bogost aptly captured this magic when he stated: “Art has done many things in human history, but in the last century especially, it has primarily tried to bother and provoke us.  To force us to see things differently.  Art changes. It’s very purpose, we might say, is to change, and to change us along with it.” (11)  It is seemingly with that very sentiment that Elaine McMillion approached her interactive and participatory documentary, Hollow.  Focusing on both the story she wished to tell and the vehicle (or technology) through which it was told, she creates a medium where viewers get to create their own meaning and navigate their own experience. 

Lev Manovich notes that the new media movement has developed new ways to represent data.  Focusing specifically on the human-computer interface, he observes that new media "radically redesigned our interactions with all of old culture. As a window of a web browser comes to supplement cinema screen…all culture, past and present, is being filtered through a computer, [and the] human – computer interface comes to act as a new form through which all forms of cultural production are being mediated." (7)  In what was initially funded through an online kickstarter campaign and then supplemented through grants, McMillion saw the power of digital media.  In an interview with PBS, she focused in on her need to create this work of carpentry.  “I was so determined to tell this story, I would have made this project without any funding, though it might have just ended up being on Tumblr. These are not just Appalachia and West Virginia problems. These are small town problems,” (http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2013/09/hollow-the-next-step-for-social-documentary)

Her work has become accessible for a much larger audience than Tumblr would have afforded.  In an era where we spend so much of our time in front of a computer screen and are quite accustomed to navigating multiple windows and applications at a time, this medium can be highly successful.  Covering the stories of over 30 residents of this rural county, the viewer/user/player can take their own private journey into a variety of non-linear episodes; getting to know the people and the background of the area.  And because of the nature of the program, each viewer can have a very personalized experience, dependant on how they navigate the site.  They may watch a large amount or a little.  They may view once or return to different stories, in a myriad of sequences.  While one viewer may see this documentary as a commentary on the waning coal industry, another may see it as an examination of the prevalent drug culture.  Readers may see the story of a people trying to survive when all the young people leave or of a town trying to rebuild itself.  The viewing and perception of the story, likewise, may significantly change depending on the solo-viewing or group-viewing of the film. 

In order to further appreciate the film, we must look at the way in which the filmmakers used the technology and data before them.  Each story seems to begin with an almost collage of images, sounds, video, etc. layered on top of each other.  The media embedded is created by both McMillion and the residents of the town.  The professional pieces are beautifully edited and concise, while the uploaded home video feels a little more personal than presentational.  Users can even download MP3’s of the music created on the screen by the residents of the town.  With a wooded backdrop, the user follows a number of paths through the stories, encountering notices about the digital media and accompanying hash-tags that were trending in relation to the storm, pre-recorded live sounds from a café or professionally produced music.  In fact, often the user will hear the character’s voice or their selected sound prior to ever seeing their image.  As stated prior, there are a number of perspectives and voices controlling the camera placement.  It may be mounted on an ATV to drive a first person perspective or held by the person speaking.  It might be interviewing them directly or observing them from a distance while they dance.  Through this technique, the viewer is enabled to decide how close they wish to get to the stories.

Further, breaking from classic filmmaking, this participatory film has neither simple narrative structure nor clear ending.  Just as the problems of her subjects are not easily solved, this doesn’t seem like a project that can be easily abandoned.  Indeed it seems to fall in step with some of Bogost’s observations on proceduralist games.  The users rely primarily on computational rules to produce their artistic meaning. The meaning seems to depend on viewer’s interactions with the film’s dynamics and mechanics. (16) Additionally, Bogost’s vision of introspection, wherein the goal of reflection, without concern for resolution or effect is central to the experience, seems central in this piece.  McMillion stated that: “I think some people come to the project interested in the tech and some for the topics, but everyone leaves with a better understanding of the issues.”  (http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2013/09/hollow-the-next-step-for-social-documentary)  And with each scene the audience encounters, she allows for her strong authorship to purport her truth, goals and aesthetics. 

Certainly, this social documentary is not a video game, but it does use technology in a similar way.  As Manovich observes, our interaction with a computer is commonplace; routine.  He further notes that “new media avant-garde is about new ways of expressing and manipulating information. Its techniques are hypermedia, databases, search engines, data mining, image processing, visualization, and stimulation." (20)  Hollow contains so many of these techniques and incorporates them in such as way that it feels accessible to a contemporary audience.  She (or the residents of the county) could continuously add to the project, change and manipulate or layer the data, creating a new digital experience for any viewers/users/players that cross its path.  Her artistic reflection of their community opens the door for wider participation and (hopefully) creates the path for change.