Jill Magid
From A Distance You Look Nothing Like a Friend (detail), neon, transformer, letters punched into wall, 2011

On Killing

2011–ongoing

This series of neon works is inspired by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman’s influential 2009 book On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society. Online controversies surrounding law enforcement protocol, combat-based video games, and post-traumatic stress disorder populate the Internet rabbit hole of further research on Grossman’s ideas about desensitization and conditioned killing. Book pages and charts embedded directly into the wall are drawn from the chapter "From A Distance You Don't Look Anything Like a Friend" which outlines the psychological relationship between physical distance and the resistance to kill.

Hand-to-Hand Combat Range, one-way neon, orange, transformer, 2015
Hand-to-Hand Combat Range, one-way neon, orange, transformer, 2015
Backstabbing and The Chase Instinct, one-way neon, book page, transformer, 2013
Backstabbing and The Chase Instinct, one-way neon, book page, transformer, 2013
Bayonet Range, one-way neon, book page, transformer, 2013
Bayonet Range, one-way neon, book page, transformer, 2013
From A Distance You Look Nothing Like a Friend (detail), neon, transformer, letters punched into wall, 2011
From A Distance You Look Nothing Like a Friend (detail), neon, transformer, letters punched into wall, 2011
From a Distance You Look Nothing Like a Friend, neon, transformer, letters punched into wall, 2011.
From a Distance You Look Nothing Like a Friend, neon, transformer, letters punched into wall, 2011.

From A Distance You Don't Look Anything Like a Fried. Neon, transformer, Embedded text in wall, 2011.

Bayonet Range, Book page, 3' one-way neon, transformer, 2013

Backstabbing and the Chase Instinct, 22" one-way neon, transformer, 2012

Hand-to-Hand Combat Range, one-way neon, orange, transformer, 2015

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