Doug Aitken

Born Redondo Beach, CA 1968
Lives Los Angeles
sleepwalkers, 2007
6 channel, 7 monitor video installation
Dimensions variable
Edition 1/6
Collection Miami Art Museum, gift of the Arison Arts Foundation

Doug Aitken creates films that present fragmented imagery and nonlinear storylines that evoke the fast pace of life in contemporary society and the way perception and memory function. He frequently takes film outside of its conventional single-screen format, employing multiple screens often placed so that they cannot be seen at the same time. He also plays with speed and pace, a method that in the 1960s and 70s became known as "expanded cinema." This approach to filmmaking is meant to capture moods and states of being rather than present an unfolding drama.

sleepwalkers is an indoor/outdoor installation that was first produced for the exterior of The Museum of Modern Art in New York in early 2007. It follows the nocturnal journeys of five city dwellers-a bicycle messenger, played by street drummer Ryan Donowho; Brazilian musician Seu Jorge as an electrician; Miami resident Cat Power, as a postal worker; actor Donald Sullivan as a businessman; and Orlando star Tilda Swinton as an office worker. sleepwalkers captures the pulsating rhythm of the city that never sleeps.

Each projection starts with a sleeping character as dusk sets on a wintry New York City. As darkness consumes the city, Aitken's sleepers awaken and carry out their separate journeys through the city in a state between reality and dream. Aitken is currently working with architects Herzog & de Meuron to adapt sleepwalkers for MAM's new building in Museum Park and is adapting this major public artwork to introduce two new Miami-based narratives.

Aitken is an alumnus of youngARTS, a program of the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, which was founded in Miami in 1981 by Lin Arison and her late husband, Ted.