Behind the Screens

I got up this morning to write about Johan Grimonprez and his up-and-coming show at the Fruitmarket Gallery (opening in a few weeks). I have however failed to do the required research due to the degree show life-takeover and, as a result, am going to have to write about this instead. I was mulling over this huge set that I've created for my demonstration, Sam Burns scrap yard relocated to ECA as I am now thinking of it, and this idea of audience involvement or 'participation'. It has always been my plan to build some kind of screen to project images onto as a sort of back-drop for everything else, however it was not until I was reading about Gob Squad's Kitchen that I considered the possibility of using the area behind the screen as a second space with a totally different function. The space behind counter-balances and counteracts, to some extent, what goes on in front. It is essentially a place for my research – the space in front acts to confuse, the one behind to explain, the space in front is cluttered from every angle, the space behind is simplistic and ordered, functional rather than decorative. How does this change the work in front of the screen? It emphasises it as a set, a performance, just one interpretation of reality rather than an attempt to preach an unknown, unitary truth. When people can get inside the set, can move in and on the stage itself it emphasises the 'falseness' of the set up itself. I want people to know that what I say and do during this performance is not FACT, some is, but there is also much unjustified opinion thrown in there. The problem with the lecture style demonstration was always going to be that people merely absorb and accept the information given without really contemplating it, I hope that getting into the space behind, digging around and seeing the cotton wool inside the brain, will make my audience realise that there no one truth in anything, least of all this performance.