A Splendid Little War / Still Savages & Lost Loves / Love Lost

2-channel outdoor projection and Pepper’s Ghost installation on the historic Battleship Olympia

It is a well-worn aphorism, alternately attributed to Winston Churchill and Walter Benjamin, that History is written by the victors. But here, the question of attribution raises still more questions about the meaning and veracity of historical records. Historically designated sights like the USS Cruiser Olympia, for all of the historical detail and rich narrative they contain, illuminate just a slice of the historical record. Hironaka & Suib are interested in reanimating or re-visioning these histories by looking at the real-world events that fell outside of the Historic Record, and reconsidering the meaning of a historical site in our contemporary context.

As a key player in the United States’ first military effort to project power overseas, the Olympia led the artists to explore the Spanish-American and Philippine-American Wars, in which the battleship was involved around the turn of the 20th Century. From our current vantage point, we can neatly trace the expansion and contraction of American Empire that began on board this ship and others in the U.S. Navy fleets of that era. Hironaka & Suib’s work in Artship Olympia uses media and motifs from the late 1800’s to encourage a critical dialogue between viewers and institutional narrative presented on board the historical war ship.

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