The ‘Set-Up,’ or Towards Surreal Infrastructure

David sits alone in the corner of his concrete studio, surrounded by wires, drawers, bits of wood and a small metal vice. A blue June sunrise is creeping its way across the hills of Los Angeles, the walls of his home on Mulholland Drive. He says, “Good Morning.” There is a phone mounted on the wall behind him, coffee on the desk, scraps of paper, a laptop mostly out of frame — the constitutive parts of an ‘art life.’ He says: “It’s June, nine, two-thousand-and-twenty, and it’s a Tuesday.” This is how David has chosen to start his day, with a report, a service, a claim to visibility. He smiles and turns to the window behind him: “Here in L.A. — beautiful blue skies, no clouds, golden sunshine, very still right now.” The camera remains fixed as he speaks, the view itself out of shot.

David has always resisted interpretation, and as a meteorologist his work is no different. He turns back to face the camera and continues: “Around sixty-five degrees fahrenheit — eighteen celsius. Should go up to a toasty ninety-three degrees this afternoon — around thirty-four celsius.” Even for L.A. — even for summer — these are hot numbers. David wears a black shirt fastened closely to the neck, sleeves neatly buttoned at the wrist. He raises his hand in an informal salute: “Have a great day everyone.”

He holds the position as the transmission ends. The video is thirty-eight seconds long.¹

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This is an excerpt from an essay written for Get Rid of Meaning: A Journal of Interdisciplinary Writing #3, published by Sticky Fingers publishing. Get it here. Or listen to an extended excerpt, from the launch, on Mixcloud

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Footnotes

1. David Lynch Theatre, ‘David Lynch's Weather Report 6/9/20’, YouTube (2020) Online ↩