Douglas Gordon

Since seeing '24 Hour Psycho' as part of the Generation exhibit at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art I have made an effort to look at more of Douglas Gordon's work.

I am interested in how people perceive certain movements and in particular hand gestures. This specific concern was unearthed why I discovered Gordon's video piece titled 'A Divided Self I and A Divided Self II'. Displayed over two screens it consisted of 2 hands interacting with each other. The two screens were near mirror images of each other.

I felt a sense of un-ease and intrigue during, and afterwards. While some would acknowledge these feelings as negative I realised that this reaction can only be a good thing, the visuals had evoked a reaction that made me feel uncomfortable and because of this I was filled with curiosity.


Why did it affect me?

How exactly did it make me feel?


These questions that I asked myself, and the mere fact I was asking myself questions is the main reason I want to create film work. I want to make people feel, and question. Whether it be negative or positive or neutral - I want a reaction. To be honest, the more negative the better!

Below are two pieces I created with 'A Divided Self I and A Divided Self II' in mind. I am pleased at what I came up with and realise that at this early stage of experimentation I have a lot to learn, but for now I wanted to see what I was capable of.

As I mentioned earlier I am interested in how people react to visuals such as these ^ and so I asked my family and friends careful questions about how they felt during and after watching these pieces. The general feedback included phrases like "creeped out" and "it scared me" or rather candidly from my Dad "arty farty". I made an effort to observe their facial expressions whilst the videos were playing and they pretty much matched up with the feedback. 

All of this helps me so much as I prepare for my first session of filming for my Final Major Project this weekend. I am constantly aware - both during filming and editing clips - of the audiences attention span and patience. 

I made sure I never asked them if they liked the pieces. I only asked how they felt. 

I don't care a bit if they liked it or not.