Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait

During the course of this project I have been directed, several times, to the work by Douglas Gordon Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait. The French art critic Philippe Parreno, with whom Gordon collaborated, described the intent behind the work as being to "make a feature film which follows the main protagonist of a story, without telling the story." According from the blog where I sourced this quote, it's about portraiture, and possibly narrative too, a claim I can support after watching snippets of it on Youtube (such as the clip below).


Seeing as my work can be read as a series of video portraits of extended length, it's quite possible that it may explore similar artistic territory as Gordon and Parreno's. However, it is impossible to evaluate the work without first considering that it was filmed by, in the words of blogger Dan Hill, " the best camera operators in US and Europe", using a mass of absurdly expensive, military-grade video equipment, and the subject is one of the world's most famous sports celebrities. I, on the other hand, used the facilities available to me and my subjects were people I know who expressed interest in the project. There are many differences you could list:

• As previously mentioned, this work is constructed on ideals - ideals of wealth. It may be a comment on then, but would it be any less of one if the filmmakers had spent half the money they had to make it? My work is very much opposed to ideals. As I wrote in my proposal it's a take on a contemporary realism of sorts.
• Part of this realism is based on honesty to the viewer, the visual documentation of perceived reality as opposed to manipulative cinematic techniques. This artwork has soft, acoustic elevator rock playing in the background. Why? To make it look and sound even more like an advertisement? It's certainly not an audio signify we're meant to consider consciously.

But the work is about repetitive actions - most of it seems to consist of Zidane running, and then slowing to a walk, then running again. And my work does document repetitive actions. But mine doesn't need a soft rock backing track to make it interesting to the viewer, they are allowed to consider the repetition how they will and find it interest in its representation, I won't force them beyond basic editing.

Two subjects and Chloe Hughes

At the moment I have two possible subjects I haven't got around to filming yet, but I hope to next week. They are the aforementioned Alex, a jewellery student and waitress, and Lachlan, an engineering student and hockey enthusiast. Ideally, I'd like to film them within the coming week, and I'm also throwing around the idea of bending the rules of the project a little to accomodate multiple sessions to cover an entire day. This may be especially relevant in the case of Sean, who's schedule is allowing of such practices.

I also saw Chloe Hughes's work at PICA, Structures to move to (conversations on work), which is similar to my work in the sense that both are documentaries of sorts, focusing on multiple individuals and their working environments. However, the most I can take from her work in terms of inspiration is justification for not prioritizing the audio in my piece. I found the monologues vaguely insightful, but almost without exception excruciatingly self-revolving and inwardly turned. Her work would have perhaps benefited from a small button placed next to the projection that, when pressed, mutes the video, and I was searching for this button within 5 minutes of sitting down. The claustrophobia may have intentional, but even if it was it completely contradicted any possible engagement with the work. I may then rely on a fixed standard of much video art and let the visuals say more than the audio.

Contemplating whether to film again and Mark Laita

After 11 hours, I decided I wanted to stop filming Sean and go home. This was mostly because I had spent long enough filming to realise what I had done right and what needed to be changed the next time, but attrition also came into it. The question remains whether I will try re-filming him, and I need to ask Sean about this. Certainly, as he pointed out, a significant portion of his day - the evening - wasn't filmed, and this, quite apart from his rather social day job, casts him in a rather more solitary light, where he spends much of free time watching television, playing his guitar and trading securities. He offered at the end of filming to be available for another day so I could film his evening as well, although we didn't discuss filming his day again.

Via thesocietypages.com, I have come across a contemporary photographer who explores similar territory - one Mark Laita. According to his artist statement, his work revolves around the "growing chasm" in American society between rich and poor, and as such he contasts portrait photographs of people on different economic strands of society but with very clearly defined connections across a spectrum. Juxtapositions such as a homeless man versus a real estate developer (pictured below) work to counter presented ideals and cultural icons with the reality of of their role in society and the relationships they share with their polar opposites.

My project is similarly concerned with the tangible spheres of influence individuals occupy within society, but as my work is in video format it is intended as more of an exercise in documenting a period of living, rather than the presentation of a particular image.



















Source: http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2011/02/21/social-commentary-through-juxtaposition-the-work-of-mark-laita/