An Anatomy
of Anchors

[40] Ley, J. War Games--Catch The LandMine!!. 2001. <http://www.heelstone.com/banner/> (aesthetic)

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Ley's animated anchor of a landmine flitting across the screen, too quick to be caught provides that jarring sense of satiric reality. Like What We Will [66], the work is driven by a single anchor. However here the anchor does not pan a landscape, but more like Him [9] or Pax [46] provides random content.

Ley explains that she deliberately uses this animation as a parody of business popups: "Yes, the sight of a dancing land mine, aping the movements of web ads like "Shock the Monkey and win $20!" is meant to be chilling."

Here the animated anchor jars the reader out of the reading experience to reflect on the juxtaposition of a horrible problem with a usually lighthearted but annoying ad.

The landmine moves across the screen. If you "lose" and do not hit a landmine, then you are rewarded with a chilling fact, such as:

finding husbands
Screenshot used by permission. This is not an anchor, but an icon showing the place of the action--a different paper, perhaps

If you "win" you "lose" an arm or a foot and are given a prosthesis:

So winning is losing.
Screenshot used by permission. This is not an anchor, but an icon showing the place of the action--a different paper, perhaps

The cartoon, playful nature also undercuts and plays on the grimly serious topic, providing the needed distance from the grisly details.