I managed to get to the Vancouver Art Gallery today, but didn't have enough time to experience the whole thing, so I limited myself to the O'Keeffe paintings, the Gillian Wearing videos, as well as a portion of the permanent collection at VAG (the Paul Wong collection seemed like it would be a little audacious for my tastes, and the Emily Carr collection looked like it deserved a lengthier visit to the gallery).
The Wearing videos were touching, to say the least. Prelude is simply four minutes of video of a woman named Lindsey, who impressed Wearing much during her short visit that she wanted to do a more in depth study, only to find out that she passed away of cirrhosis of the liver before they could start anything. It is slow-motion footage of Lindsey with a voice-over by her twin sister, and the video shows a woman going from appearing incredibly charismatic to disintegrating into outburst and then weariness.
The 23-minute-long Drunk is footage on three 'screens' of South London drinkers in the throws of inebriation. While it is at times humourous, it is really an exposé of the dark side of alcohol, of the violence and depravity that it can cause. Apparently actors were used as well as actual drunks, and we are given no indication of who is who (although I have my suspicions).
Much of the discomfort the video intentionally provokes comes not only from the horrible mood most of the participants are in, but also in the fact that the camera stays focussed on a subject for so long. In our movies and our TV, we're used to 10 seconds (and less) of footage on a person before the scene or focus changes. Here the camera stays as if ithey were long takes, watching as a drunk woman (who is fairly well dressed as well as middle-age) fall over while, simultaneously on another screen, we see the full process of a drunkard falling asleep in his own drool. At one point one of the Vancouver Art Gallery security guards-slash-information officers, on his own volition, came in and gave a running commentary of the "fight" scene, almost ruining its poignancy.
At some point I'll return to take in the Carr exhibits, but the Wearing videos were well worth the student admission I paid despite being already graduated. – (David Chun)
