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THE WATCHERS...

The watchers - a gang of seven damaged celestial agents - have been thrown out of heaven. As they fall to earth like the giant comets that fell in 50,000 B.C., each character shatters into segments which fall across the seven continents.

The Hard Way is a multi-dimensional project that will exist both on-line and off. The on-line component will be implemented in parts. Its first phase will outline seven different characters ("watchers"), and territories ("earths"). Subsequent phases will include: reports from a series of expeditions which are to be undertaken by Matthew Ritchie over the course of the coming year; a participatory game-like interface based on a description written by the artist: and an animated film featuring the same characters. This web project will also link to a series of exhibitions in Paris, New York, and Oslo.

The Hard Way is a narrative describing the nature of information. It is a parallel history, a map of the past redrawn as a story, pitting archetypes against myths. It could, in this sense, be described as a meta-narrative. It is a story about the act of storytelling. Each element embodies a characteristic of information processing -- methods of thinking like trial and error and observation. The complete narrative serves as a model of thought, an algorithm of consciousness.

-- Matthew Ritchie

The Hard Way "tour calendar"

1996

1997