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May. 1 - May. 2, 1979
Diamond Head investigates middle class family life, subsuming themes of love, marriage, sex, greed, and mishap under an existential query into values and meaning. The characters, fashioned out of two diamond-shaped pieces of cardboard, become embroiled in a series of rather loosely linked chronological events. Each vignette is a kind of video "morality play," all of which are strung together to end on an arbitrary note, rather than in a true denouement. The tape opens with "She" coming of age, looking for lovers, all of whom "She" rejects until the right "He" catches her eye. The attraction is stylized, crude and comical. The episodes that unfold are symbolic, tongue-in-cheek, paranoid and romantic. Oursler's cardboard scenarios are microcosms of our own reality. Humanity stands nearly helpless as fate and our unconscious cultural assumptions follow us to the grave.