Viewing page 24 of 26

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

"Video art has been kept in a kind of limbo." (John J. O'Connor)

TV VIEW

Video Artists' Quest

Continued from Page 31

At 11 on Channel J, he himself stars in "Dr. Videovich's 'The Live! Show,'" which a poster describes as "a variety show featuring real and invented personalities from the art world, with interviews, opinions, art performances, live call-ins, art lessons and much more, all in a half-hour of lively entertainment." In short, video is going the traditional television route with a vengeance. At 11:30 on Channel C, the Artists Television Network is presenting "SoHo Television," a showcase for alternative-TV and video art.
Speaking with a fairly heavy accent, Mr. Davidovich, in the guise of Dr. Videovich, projects a persona somewhere between Bela Lugosi and Andy Kaufman. He wears a white jacket and offers his peculiar prescriptions for the future, couched in a context that borrows from the theater of the absurd. He suggests, for instance, that people should leave messages on their television sets the way they do with refrigerator doors. "This is a good way to make TV more dynamic," he insists. The Davidovich manner is never less than genially intense, even as he tries to sell television-related toys from his own extensive collection ("Videokitsh by Videovich").

Mr. Davidovich's appearance on WNYC's "Videoville" will be made through a compilation tape featuring segments from his cable show. At one point, he explains that "I started in the University of Argentina where I learned, with German professors, how to manipulate the media." In any event, beneath the calculated wackiness there lurk serious intentions regarding the future of video artists. After reviewing the innumerable art movements of past decades, Mr. Davidovich has observed, "There is nothing left to do except television, which is the art most typical of this century." For the time being, when Dr. Videovich's on-air telephone rings, too many of the callers are merely cranks. But Mr. Davidovich shows no signs of giving up.