O.J. Simpson Project - 1977

Variable size

Film and video installation
Exhibited at the Albright Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York, 1977

The artist's interview with O.J. Simpson is shown on two monitors placed to either side of a video/film projection of Simpson in a football game. On the opposite side of the space are two video/film projections of a crowd watching the game. The two part crowd is a panorama projected continuously, without synchronization, on linked screens.
Collection of the Museo Reina Sofia, Madrid

Review(s) on O.J. Simpson Project, 1977

The large scale of Welch’s 1977 piece anticipated the evolution of video in the 1980s, as artists moved away from monitors and increasingly turned to projecting expansive images that rival painting or even attain architectural scale.
Joseph Jacobs, Art in America, May 2007

Two adjacent screens, opposite the gridiron scenes, show sections of seated fans. Those on front rows are near enough to have personalities. Kids mug for the camera and a loud-mouthed referee offers nonstop, gratuitous advice. Others melt into a jazzy mosaic of multitudes clad in bright-colored rain gear. Their comings and goings after food and comfort and their agitated movements are an accurate gauge of the game they watch.
Suzanne Muchnic, Los Angeles Times, November 15, 1977