The image of the work is not available online.
If It's Too Bad to Be True, It Could Be DISINFORMATION, 1985
This video was part of an installation with the same title, taken from an article in The New York Times accusing the U.S. Government of spreading false information on Nicaragua. According to the U.S. Government, Nicaragua had bought MIG planes to attack the United States. By incorporating press material, Rosler creates a collusion of text and image that questions the authority and objectivity of the media. As in other of her works, the formal structure is inseparable from her political analysis. In a clear reference to the NBC Nightly News and other news programmes on U.S. television channels, Rosler analyses their deceptive syntax through the asymmetry and incoordination between text and image, and captures the confusion inserted intentionally into the news script. Stressing the fact that there is never a straight story, Rosler asserts her presence in a character-generated text that isolates excerpts from the original broadcast sources, rolling over the manipulated images.
Technical details
- Original title:
- If It's Too Bad to Be True, It Could Be DISINFORMATION
- Registration number:
- 3238
- Artist:
- Rosler, Martha
- Date created:
- 1985
- Date acquired:
- 2008
- Fonds:
- MACBA Collection. Barcelona City Council long-term
- Object type:
- Audiovisual recording
- Media:
- Single-channel video, color, sound, 16 min 26 s
- Credits:
- MACBA Collection. Barcelona City Council long-term loan
- Copyright:
- © Martha Rosler
- It has accessibility resources:
- No
The MACBA Collection features Catalan, Spanish and international art and, although it includes works from the 1920s onwards, its primary focus is on the period between the 1960s and the present.
For more information on the work or the artist, please consult MACBA's Library. To request a loan of the work, please write to colleccio [at] macba.cat.
If you need a high resolution image of the work, you must submit an image loan request.
