The work of Janet Cardiff
I see Janet Cardiff’s work as a examination of ideas, theories, or preconceptions. Her installations play off like a performance but they are exploring an idea. They show you what you might associate a preconception such as “The Carnie” and presents it to you in a box for you to examine.
And in the “Ghost Machine” she uses technology in the form of a video camera and audio track to make you feel like you are in the presence of ghost.
The per-recorded video gives you the experience of exploring that world while the audio gives you a narrative and instructions on how to explore that world. At the end you see that it was all a play and you were a part of it. But you were not there, all this happened around you but apart from you.
You can listen to the audio clips to get a sense of the experience and the immersion into this world.
For the best result use headphones.
http://www.cardiffmiller.com/artworks/walks/ghostmachine.html#