Kate Gorman

Friend of a friend

GPS-located digital text, digital audio, digital photographs set in Columbia, MO
45-minute walk
print and digital book
9 inches by 6 inches, 49 pages
2018-2019

The initial work is a site-specific fictional memoir with three different non-linear story tracks to follow. It was created for the 2018 True/False Film Fest. The original digital elements were connected to eight of the festival venues, and attendees could read, view, and listen to these components via smartphone in any order as they waited to watch films. The GPS-guided experience can be found at https://www.izi.travel .

The print book version of Friend of a Friend was created in 2019. The book contains all of the text from the emails and transcripts of the cassette tape audio recordings featured in the GPS-located work, along with black and white versions of the old color photos of the artist and her friends from college.

The digital version of the book has the color versions of the photos and is available to download as a PDF.

A video trailer for Friend of a Friend that shows text slides intercut with old color photos of groups of young people in college. The artist is in focus in each photo, but all the other people are blurred out.

The text slides read: Friend of a Friend / you are supposed to meet up with Kate / one of your friend’s old college pals / Kate has something she wants to give your friend / your friend makes all the arrangements / and reminisces with you about Kate and their friendship / you learn things about Kate as you trade emails / some things about her are interesting / others aren’t so great / but you don’t seem to be getting the whole story / after what you learn about Kate / you have to decide / do you still want to meet up with her? / experience Friend of a Friend at the Transmedia Arcade during the True/False Film Fest in Columbia, MO March 1-4

The audio track has the click of a cassette tape recorder button being pressed, the buzz of the tape playing in the background with the voice of the artist saying: is this recording? / [breathing sounds] / testing, testing / ah, that’s better, okay / okay, let’s see [breath exhale] / hi, it’s been a while. The audio ends with the recording button clicking as it’s being released.