This video is composed of photographs of Mexico’s Instituto politecnico nacional taken upon its completion in 1964. The video animates the still images using zooms and pans and takes the viewer on a tour of the campus in its pristine, just-completed state. The tour is divided into four sections (Administration, Workshops, Classrooms, and Recreation), each announced by a colour slide. The voice of a narrator occasionally interrupts the modern musical soundtrack to offer technical data on the construction of the complex. By avoiding mention of the geographic location of the Polytechnic complex, the video highlights its universalism—it could have been built in Canada, Brazil, Mexico, or any other country.
Documentation: Video excerpt; video stills and source images; monograph of the Instituto Politecnico Nacional, Mexico, 1964
Terence Gower, 2005
Digital Video, 8:20 minutes
Edit: Anita Chao
Voice: Constanze Guthenke
Graphics: Natalia Porter
Digital Imaging: Tod Seelie and Lindsay Stadig
Sound: Aaron Mullan
Recorded at Echo Canyon, New York City
Photography: Guillermo Zamora, René Sagastume, Federico Espinoza, Guillermo Ordorica, Gabriel Reyes, Arturo Horiuchi (for the inaugural monograph of the Instituto Politecnico Nacional, Mexico, 1964)
Photographs of IPN monograph: Tod Seelie
Text: Craig Buckley and Leonardo Diaz-Borioli
