04/01/10

The narrative experiment was a good one. I think it helped us eliminate a part of our practice that we were curious about but which did not really reflect the fundamental objective of our work... and it was through this experiment that our real purposes actually became apparent. By splitting the narrative we had filmed into its separate active elements, all of which we displayed on separate looping screens, our work once more became about the way in which we moved within the frame of the screen, the visual duality we expressed around this movement, the minimalistic formality of our movement/selves/setting and the multiplicity of the work's display. To answer the question, narrative was scrapped in favour of the description that has constantly been banded our way, sculptural performance. By this I mean that I would like our videos to concentrate on the formalistic elements of our performance: our movement or non-movement within a defined space, the minimal setting, the synching or non-synching of our motions over time and the layering of these efforts into multidimensional works. As a journey of our own private self discovery, this does not mean that I want to abandon all avenues of personal relation in our sculptural performance as I think there is an important connection between our working relationship as artists/friends and the outcome of our sculptural works and choreographed movements together. I always like the idea of our work reflecting something quite 'silly' or 'serious' (I'm thinking the 'bum jelly' proposal here...) about our relationship that we can perceive and view in our own work, and I guess in that sense that those who know us can share too... but at the same time providing a very formally resolved outcome for an original audience presenting a focus on ourselves as objects rather than ourselves as characters.

I have been discussing the balance/non-balance that I would like to see in our work between ourselves as detached sculptures/forms and ourselves as recognisable personalities/individuals. What do you think that balance should be (a bit of both, just sculptural, just personal)? Or if you feel that there is a more important focus for our work that you would like to bring to the board, what would that be?