About the Artwork
Paik uses video as his art form to create rapidly moving images that combine to form the pattern of stars and stripes of the American flag. The television sets project a flickering series of predominantly red, white, and blue images meant to visually engage the viewer who is accustomed to the passivity associated with watching television. Paik emphasizes the pop cultural influences of America, the stars and stripes of the flag, and the television set, while making a metaphorical statement about the dominance of technology in the twentieth century.
Video Flag x
1985
Nam June Paik
1932 - 2006
American
Unknown
84 10-inch quasar televisions, 3 channels of video (color), laserdiscs, laserdisc players, acrylic cabinet
Overall: 74 1/2 × 138 3/4 inches (189.2 cm × 3 m 52.4 cm)
Film and Video
Contemporary Art after 1950
Founders Society Purchase with funds from Lila and Gilbert B. Silverman
F1986.40
Ken Hakuta
Markings
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Provenance
The artist
(Carl Solway Gallery, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA)
1986-present, purchase by the Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit, Michigan, USA)
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Bulletin of the DIA 62, no. 3 (1986): cover and fig. 1 (ill).
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Credit Line for Reproduction
Ken Hakuta
Nam June Paik, Video Flag x, 1985, 84 10-inch Quasar televisions, 3 channels of video (color), Laserdiscs, Laserdisc players, acrylic cabinet. Detroit Institute of Arts, Founders Society Purchase with funds from Lila and Gilbert B. Silverman, F1986.40.
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