Haunting (or what it means to be a ghost)

Milo Sharafeddine

Visual Arts and Post-Contemporary Practice

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I’m interested in challenging linear ways of understanding identity, crafting knowledge, and listening to and telling stories. The themes that inspire my work are often related to the instability of personhood, place and its social meaning, ghosts and haunted symbolism, and technology—specifically digital imagery and recording, internet-age media, and their alternative histories. I use alternative histories to mean the romantic, nostalgic, grim, or uncomfortable stories, reactions, discourses, and lore that exist outside of the mainstream discussion of these topics.

profile photo by Iliana Michali

Video links: i live in many houses _ Air _ Air 2 _ HTTTP [REAL!]

In my research, I use the term ghosthood as a word for what it means to be a ghost. I posit pollution, transformativeness, omission, and nonlinearity as qualities of ghosthood. Using this deconstructed understanding of the ghost, my work revolves around finding a new definition for haunting. What does it mean for an object, a place, a story, or an artwork to be haunted?

I turn to technology and place as case studies for this exploration.

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"I suppose it is just a matter of romance and sentimentality that I choose to explore technology and place– they feel personal, and beautiful, and tragic, and inexplicable, and I think these qualities are just as present in ghosthood as their previously mentioned counterparts. They’re just infinitely more difficult to dissect."

On Haunted Places

This installation features two works. The first is I.D.S.T., a wall sculpture made using wood, plaster, paper, glue, crayon, marker, and shoe-polish. The second is HTTTP or How to Talk to Places [REAL!], a video which includes filmed scenes and frame-by-frame animated segments.

"I remember certain video game environments the way I remember houses I grew up in. Most of the time, I would be watching as my sister played, entering creepy cabins filled with deadly monsters, and even though she knew she was in no real danger, she would proceed with caution, and even though I wasn’t even the one playing, I would feel threatened, frightened, as though at any moment, I may find myself there. You wouldn’t be able to convince me, then or now, that those weren’t real places."

HTTTP [REAL!] (2023)

How to Talk to Places [REAL!]

HTTTP centers the perspective of place as a viral video trend invites the public to approach places for an interview. The video questions not only what kind of stories places could hold, but what gives them the title of place to begin with. The video and installation also nod to growing up online, and the unstable border between our bodies and virtual space, asking the question “who's haunting who?”

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"I know they’re watching, listening. They are just as rightly characters in this world as we are. I often hear people say “man, if these walls could talk…”. I’m here to tell you that they can. And if you ask politely, they will reveal their secrets to you..."

I.D.S.T. (side 1)

I.D.S.T.

I.D.S.T.* examines the haunted qualities of places, distancing itself from the mainstream representation of old, abandoned houses and instead approaching the idea of haunting through the lens of ghosthood.

The wall sculpture is created through repeating three steps: first, images are postered on the wall. Second, I write and draw on them in reflection. Finally, I plaster over the wall again, keeping only a few windows that look through to the previous layer. This ritual reflects the transformative nature of place: the way it ages, and the way we grow within it.

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A dark wall with a projection on the left, and a CRT television on the right. The projected video features Milo's face under a light image of a ghost. The video on the CRT television features a cloaked figure in a forest setting.

Air (2022)

On Haunted Technology

This two-part project explores technology as a haunted phenomenon. The first work, titled Air, tells a nonlinear history of technological landmarks and the way they created public discourse about death and mortality. The second work, Air 2, focuses on the public's response to the tape recorder, and uses home voice recordings found on the Internet Archived, dated between the 1960s and the 1980s.

Both are video installations. The first is minimal, emphasizing the equipment used, while the second is a scenographic installation featuring a domestic setting in order to emphasize the pseudo-familiarity of found images.

A domestic setting featuring rugs, an arm chair near a radio, a desk with books and a tape recorder, a guitar, and a wall decorated with several photos, a sconce, and a small projection of a video

Air 2 (2023)

A high shelf with a handheld video camera, overlayed with a large projection of its image

Air (2022)

When I work with a topic like technology, even though I’m inspired by its physical and functional aspects, I find its philosophical and emotional aspects to be just as important. Why does audio crackle make me feel warm and nostalgic? Why did the X-Ray instantly become a fetish object? Why do some video games make me homesick?

.-. .' `. : : : `. : ``. : `. : : . `. : : ` . `. `.. : `. ``; `:; `:' : `. `. `. . `'`'`'`---..,___`;.-'