GORDON'S WORK BLASPHEMOUSLY MERGES GOOD AND EVIL
The dark arts
Play Dead: Real Time
Rosie Lesso looks through the screen into the dark and troubled mind of Douglas Gordon, and finds his art to be Superhumanatural.
ust days before Halloween. the exterior lights of
the Royal Scottish Academy were switched from
white to red. casting a warning beacon to the city that something dramatic and uneasy was afoot. liive huge black posters were unfurled over the facade. bearing iridescent white eyes and the monstrous title Superhumanatural below them in large red letters the name: ‘Douglas (iordon'. Yes. the much awaited retrospective of Scottish artist and former Turner prize winner Douglas Gordon has arrived.
On entering the RSA we are faced with two huge piles of TV monitors collectively titled. ‘livery Film and Video Work from About 1992 Until Now to be Seen on Monitors. Some with Headphones. ()thers Run Silently and All Simultaneously". 1992—2000. The range of videos playing on the screens is exhaustive and overwhelming. In one corner a red rowing boat floats never-endineg on grey water: in another (iordon lies flat on a carpet listening to a walkman. A hand gradually colours its partner with a permanent black
marker. while. elsewhere. a palm slaps the monitor as if
trying to smother us. Bernard l‘lcrrmann's haunting score for the Hitchcock movie Vertigo has been extracted for Gordon’s ‘lieature
Film‘. 199‘). Here we see close tips of the conductor
James (‘onlon‘s overtly expressive hands and face. seemingly conducting an unseen orchestra. the film running simultaneously on two mirror image screens facing each other. Past memories of the music are re- contextualised. but. more appropriately. the music forins an emotive soundtrack for most of the exhibition.
‘Play Dead: Real Time'. 2003 is more accessible. and
overwhelmineg visceral. Two enormous double sided screens are placed at random angles in the darkened space. each presenting a circus elephant performing tricks. including ‘playing dead‘. Watching this beautiful creature heave the bulky mass of his heavy body around is absorbing. the camera pushing tip close to the appealing earthiness of his crinkled skin.
In lnverleith llouse‘s ‘Pretty much every word written. spoken. heard and overheard from 1989 until now'. 2006. the walls. shutters. skirting boards and hallways are covered with randomly placed phrases resembling apologies. propositions. threats and stray thoughts. Like the RSA monitors. these are the loose wanderings of the subconscious mind. In ('aledonian llaII. Gordon‘s ‘Between Darkness and Light (After William BIakc)‘. 1997. tises simultaneous projections
of Henry King‘s innocent I943 film The Song of
Bernadette. and William liriedkin‘s 'I'lte Iz'xm'eist onto opposite sides of a translucent screen. the two films surreptitiously weaving in and out of one another. blasphemoust merging good and evil and implying the two are not so very different; like (‘ranach‘s 'I‘ree. (‘hristian ideology is thrown into question. Despite the initial Halloween spooks. there is much greater depth here: at best. (iordon reveals his ability to combine simplicity and accessibility with complex ideas found at the root of our consciousness.
Superhumanatural - Douglas Gordon, The Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh and the Royal Botanical Gardens, Edinburgh until Sun 14 January 2007 0000.
Visual Art
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