JOSHUA THORSON — PORTFOLIO (4 of 10)

Horizon (excerpt)

Horizon (2012, 13 minutes, Hi-8 video, stereo)

Written, directed, and edited by Joshua Thorson

Narrated by Kyle deCamp

In 1982 Walt Disney World’s EPCOT Center, or, the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow, 

opened to the public, a little late for an utopic modernist project. The original park featured an “infotainment” 

ride called Horizons, which was sponsored by G.E. It showed a future in which technology and innovation 

coupled with the family unit would evolve into exciting and previously unimaginable territories–with colonies 

in outer space and under the Earth’s oceans. In 2000, the ride was demolished to make way for an immersive 

thrill-ride called “Mission: Space.” The story in this video, about a family doing research on a colony in the 

Chamaleon Complex whose supplies and funding inexplicably stop arriving, and who are determined to 

survive however they can, accompanies archival Hi-8 video footage of the original EPCOT ride.

Premiered at Pleasure Dome ("Magic Kingdoms"), Toronto, 2012

Onion City, Chicago, 2012

Video_Dumbo @ Eyebeam, NYC

Rencontres Internationales Paris/Berlin/Madrid, 2012/13.