M.–
M.– lurks in the labyrinth of the urban jungle. A shadowy figure, he inhabits the city's darkest recesses, its abandoned factories and underground tunnels. M.– is living memory, undeterred by the ravages of age, time and decay. He is No Man and Every Man, one of a million cogs in the wheels that breathe life into the stones and mortar of a place. Cities change rapidly, seemingly in the blink of an eye. Landmarks seem to be there forever, and then overnight, disappear suddenly. People, too, inhabit neighborhoods where they live, work, marry and have children, spend their lifetimes and even their deaths — all within the parameters of a few blocks. Then one day the city comes and swallows them up, wiping any trace of their existence. M.– knows. He is the eternal witness.
— Edward Hillel, in Coming Soon…, page 70“The video tour of the site highlights the surrealism of industrial machinery. Enormous green vats, encrusted in corroded pipe and incomprehensible dials, look as if they could have been dreamed up by Max Ernst rather than designed to fulfill a useful purpose. Hillel conducts an autopsy on the industrial monster, probing around its labyrinthine insides. Occasionally his camera catches a flash of a retreating shadow, like the sewer chase sequence from The Third Man. At other times it looks like something Piranesi would have come up with if he had had access to video equipment.”
— Alfred Hackling, The Guardian 07/20/02
2–channel film projection with immersive soundtrack in a custom-designed viewing room (24'); photographic c–prints front-mounted on plexiglass
2002