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The Other Side of Video Faz
by Rubén Gallo

In a short text titled The Mirror Stage, Jacques Lacan describes the infant’s first encounter with his own reflection. At this early point in his development, the infant has not yet created boundaries between himself and the external world: his body is not yet a complete entity, but rather a series of disperse fragments and unrelated sensations: a hand that touches, an ankle that hurts, an itchy nose...

One day, while still inhabiting this world of indefinition and fragmentation, the infant stumbles by chance upon a mirror, and experiences a great pleasure in contemplating his own reflection. Suddenly, the many organs in the infant's body - which he had only experienced as unrelated fragments - appear unified in a complete, harmonious entity. This encounter leaves a strong impression on the child, who identifies with the image in the mirror and thinks - deceptively, as the “I” of subjectivity has yet to be formed - "that is who I am," "that is what I look like." From this moment on, the child longs to be like his reflected double, yearning for bodily unity, for the coherent harmony of his image.

Eventually, the child evolves into a "subject," but the epiphany of the mirror stage will continue to haunt him. The subject keeps coming back to the pleasure of the idealized image. And if the subject possesses what we call "artistic talent," it does not surprise us that he would devote at least a part of his artistic production to the investigation of his imaginary double. Like the infant before the mirror, an artist who creates a self-portrait plays with the possibility to invent and reinvent himself, to ask and find an answer to the timeless question "who am I?"

Video is an ideal medium for experimenting with self-representation, since it creates a sensation of presence and immediate reality that surpasses the possibilities afforded by painting or photography. Video resembles a mirror in its capacity to reflect movement, variations in perspective, and the limits of a visual field; the artist has the freedom to represent - as realistically as he wants - the way in which he perceives himself, the way in which he thinks he is perceived by others. These are the types of works grouped in Video Faz - experiments on self-representation, investigations of the possibilities afforded by video.

In AIUEONN Six Features (1993), Takahiko Iimura (Japan, 1937) represents himself pronouncing the six Japanese "vowels." While pronouncing each letter, his face is digitally manipulated to imitate the form of the “vowel” in question. These mutations and permutations are a graphic illustration of the "deformations" suffered by a subject when he is transplanted from one linguistic context to another.

Rainer Ganahl (Austria) is also interested in the structures of language. Basic Korean (1996) shows the artist speaking Korean in an overly animated manner. "My name is Rainer. I’m learning Korean. Bye bye!" he repeats again and again in a seemingly endless loop. This work is part of a series of video installations about the commodification of language-learning for which the artist has obsessively learned Greek, Japanese, Chinese, as well as Korean.

The Singing Lesson (1994) by Lucy Gunning (England, 1964) also addresses the question of learning. This work consists of two monitors positioned face to face. The first shows the singing instructor enthusiastically demonstrating various vocalization techniques. The other monitor shows Lucy Gunning attempting - and failing - to follow the teacher's instructions. This piece is a mise-en-scène of the artist's repeated failure to learn - to follow orders and instructions. Ultimately, this failure emerges as a celebration of an individual subjectivity which refuses to participate in a homogenizing pedagogical process.

Cheryl Donegan (USA, 1962) investigates the effects that cultural stereotypes produce upon the subject. Practisse (1994) presents a series of vignettes showing the artist painting crude features over her own face. In one scene her face is covered with a plastic bag, and in another, she appears on a television screen. These actions are accompanied by the sound of James Joyce reading from Finnegan’s Wake. These mesmerizing sequences highlight the abyss that separates the subject from representation, since - in contrast to traditional self-portraits - the "real" subject never disappears from the picture.

Aunrico Gatson (USA, 1966) is also interested in cultural stereotypes, but from the perspective of an African-American artist. In Two Heads in a Box (1991), the artist appears with his face painted black, mouthing the words to Gershwin’s Let Me Sing and I’m Happy, sung by Al Jolson. Gatson’s almost maniacal delivery and exaggerated smile highlights the absurdity inherent in the vaudeville stereotype of the cheerful, easygoing black man. Like his makeup and costume, the "happiness" celebrated so emphatically by the artist is unmasked as an empty simulation.

Silvia Gruner (Mexico, 1959) is also interested in unmasking cultural stereotypes. In Situ (1995) presents a close-up of the artist clenching a pre-Columbian figure between her teeth. She licks the idol repeatedly as she fixes the viewer with an aggressive gaze. This piece sets up a trap for the viewer, who is tempted to decode the figurine - a symbol of how cultural clichés and stereotypes are formed - as an emblem of "Mexicanness" or "Mexican culture."

The Fisherman (1996) by Javier Téllez (Venezuela, 1969) shows a tiny statue of a Chinese fisherman, next to the artist’s head seen in profile. The little fisherman has got his hook in the artist’s mouth, and the artist in turn seems to be slowly breathing his last breaths, his eyes glazed over. This video turns the television into a fishbowl, commenting on the anesthetic effects that television produces on its viewers, turning them into passive and fish-like subjects.

In The Space Program (Face with Sounds, 1995) by Robert Beck (USA) we see an out-of-focus close-up of the artist’s face, which at first sight appears as an abstract composition of colors and forms. The soundtrack reproduces a random series of special effects like crashes and explosions. This piece creates a disjunction between sound and image - an effect which serves as a metaphor for the split between the psyche and the external world in the subject.

In Come to Your Own (1993), Knut Åsdam (Norway, 1968) investigates the hypno-therapeutic possibilities of video. In this work, the artist appears dressed in black, sitting in an empty white room, repeating the same phrase endlessly. The pseudo-hypnotic phrase invites the viewer/patient to enter a space, to become aware of his physical presence, and eventually to “come to his own.” This piece explores how affect is transmitted in conversation, and plays with the relationship established between viewer and video-subject.

Autogol Kiss (Self Portrait x 2, 1995) by Thomas Glassford (USA, 1963) illustrates the possibilities offered by video in self-portraiture. At first, this work appears to portray two men kissing; upon closer inspection, however, we realize that the two faces are identical. Though the work looks like it was produced with digital manipulation and complicated editing techniques, it was actually produced with a camera and a mirror. Using these rudimentary instruments, Glassford has staged the most narcissistic of all fantasies: seducing the image in the mirror.

Video Faz thus groups works by ten artists who have used video to explore the possibilities and limits of self-representation. These “self-portraits” do not attempt to create a monolithic or totalitarian image of the artist, but rather investigate - often with a sense of humor - the many ways to see and to be seen.