The Bead Game

The Bead Game (1977) by Indian award-winning video artist Ishu Patel commences with a variety of coloured beads, forming into an assortment of shifting creatures that each devours the succeeding and equally magnificent creature. From the first single cell that divides itself, the view of nature is destructive. By the end of the first minute these simple organisms have formed more sophisticated beings though the tenor of the piece remains the same. Inexorably the creatures become ever more intelligent with no diminution in their destructive tendencies. Ape evolves to man, and Ishu launches himself into a history from Greek warriors to the atomic bomb, all doomed to destroy the other...