Framed by Curtains

Santos bases his selfdescribed video letter from Hong Kong on the ambiguity of the word frame He refers to the picture or camera frame as well as to the variable frame rate of digitally manipulated video and finally to the act of framing as a process by which one names describes and in some sense colonizes the object of perception Images of transit commuters buses boats subways stop and start run backward and flutter across the screen yielding brief glimpses of a face or a gesture as if they are being scanned for meaning Indeed by directly addressing the viewer through flashes of text Have you ever been framed Santos suggests the colonial history that haunts everyday life in modern Hong Kong