Palace of Machinery

Created by Stephan Moore & Jenny Boles | USA | 29 min loop | 4-channel video & 8-channel sound | Installation

A haunting multi-screen reanimation of archival films shot inside Pittsburgh’s Westinghouse factories and first exhibited at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair. Four floor-to-ceiling images span a single wall while eight channels of sound fold the room into a living echo chamber. Visions of progress and spectacles of orchestrated labor return as disorienting afterimages, asking what our own modern “palaces” demand of us today.

Previously exhibited: FEED Media Art Center, Erie, PA (Mar–Jun 2025)

Artist Bios

Jenny Boles makes films and moving-image works that interrogate labor, infrastructure, and ecology through historical inquiry. She holds a PhD in History (Indiana University) and an MFA in Documentary Media (Northwestern). She is Assistant Professor in the School of Film & Photography at Montana State University.

Stephan Moore is a sound artist focused on the creation and perception of sonic environments across installation, performance, spatial audio, and custom instrument design. He holds an MFA (RPI) and PhD (Brown) and has collaborated and toured with Pauline Oliveros.