History of Video Art

There is a huge gap between film and video art. When I think of film, I see movie theaters. I see directors, actors, sets, and scenes. I hear beautiful background music and sounds, and listen to professional writing. Film is of a high interest for me. When it comes to video art I see something completely different. I would say that about 90% of the 'video art' that I have ever seen has left me either confused or unsatisfied. I'm sure there are plenty of good examples of video art out there, I have yet to experience them. Recently in both EMAC and elements, I have been introduced to a bunch of video artist and their pieces. Some are rather interesting while others seem to lose all artistic merit. I feel this medium is hard for artist to use to produce something other than film. I've seen videos of a guy crying for 40minuts, I've seen random collages of people and images talking in weird ways and floating all over the place. I try to search for a message of symbol but every time I identify with one, I lose it in the crazyness before me. I have seen some amazing work before. Not everything video-art related confuses me. The work of  Alejandro Jodorowsky has astounded me. His use of symbolism and imagery blew me away. Many of his works are out of this world, yet for some reason i can stay with his films and follow what he is trying to say. With other artist I feel they fail to capture the audience. I still find interest in this field and hope to look into it further despite my bad experiences so far.