A few years back I had the opportunity to see Stan Douglas's Monodramas at the Guggenheim in New York. At the time I was studying photography at the School of Visual Arts, my Junior year, and was working on a photographic project entitled Story Telling. I know, very original and unique right. It was a project in which I was plumbing the possibility for photographs to be structured as ambiguous open ended narratives that would invite viewer interaction/interpretation. Initially what drew my interest to Douglas's Monodramas was biased. I neglected to understand the conceptual complexity of Douglas's work and instead focused on his process of creating ambiguous narratives open for interpretation. How ever Douglas's work is far more complex than creating simple dramas.
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| Stan Douglas_Monodrama_1991_"Don't Call Me Gary" |
Douglas's Television Spots/Monodramas were made at the hight of post modern art practice. The short videos explore the hallmark trope that many artist were plumping in their work, namely the minutiae of everyday life. Douglas particular aesthetic, especially in the Monodramas, reflects the slick advertising technique found in the late 80's early 90's commercials. Unlike the average television ad the video pieces do not include those devices that anchor something specific and concrete. Namely narrator, text, product placement, narrative. These devices which normally help the viewer interpret the message, what to buy, etc, are absent. As the viewer of Television Spots/Monodramas we are set into the middle of an ambiguous setting without the narrative safety of beginning middle or end. We are left to interpret the video for what it is, and subsequently what it is not.
Douglas's process reveals the empty shell of advertising through these absences while critiquing the function/spectacle/promise of advertising. In one of the Monodramas, personally the one I enjoy the most, the viewer is presented with three scenes involving a car. Instead of a car commercial presenting the viewer with the romantic trappings of travel on the open road, the promise of status and happiness, Douglas's commercial presents the everyday mundane reality that surrounds the culture of the automobile. Cars break down, cars drive on the highway in daily exercises of commuting, and every grand adventure in a car usually ends in the same non desrcript parking spot.
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Videos at Vodpod.
You can view a larger resolution below at Ubuweb's Stan Douglas site.
