A Very Good Year: Duncan Campbell wins the Turner Prize 2014
The odds had it right ahead of the 30th Turner Prize, which last night went to Duncan Campbell for his exhibition as part of the Scotland+Venice programme at the 2013 Venice Biennale. In the original exhibition, as well as during its presentation in The Common Guild in Glasgow two months ago, Campbell set out two rooms, with a film work in each. In the first room there was a 1953 film by Christopher Marker and Alan Resnais, then in the second room the response by Campbell titled 'It for Others'.
There was an obvious predominance of film-based work in the Tate exhibition of the nominees. Ciara Philips was the only one out of the four nominated artists that did not include video within her exhibited work, instead working dynamically and imaginatively with printmaking, specifically screen printing. However, the fact that video features in Campbell’s, James Richards’ and Tris Vonna-Michell’s work doesn’t hold much weight as a criticism of the judges’ choice of nominees, when the obvious diversity of each of their practices to one another is considered.
This difference in approach and interests is clear across the work of Campbell, Tris Vonna-Michell and Richards. While Campbell works with the structure of the film essay, Richards’ work operates atmospherically as he presents a collection of sensuously distorted visuals, accompanied by rich, experimental sound. Different again, Vonna-Michell included a video that collated spoken texts that had been part of an earlier performance – Finding Chopin – as well as long panning shots of items collected as part of his research into the composer. Vonna-Michell's work makes very effective use of what he describes as the idiosyncratic and "natural rhythm" of his quick pace of speech, compared to the slower pace of interpretation allowed by his images.
Les Statues Meurent Aussi, which leads into Campbell's Turner-winning work
Campbell’s work It for Others is in many ways the most demanding of the four presentations included in the nominees’ exhibition in London. The film begins with a reflection on Les Statues Meurent Aussi, the 1953 film by Chris Marker and Alan Resnais. In this first chapter, issues are posed relating to the status of objects classed as African art. How can these be understood outside of the entire lifeworld within which they operated? This concern is then superseded by the accessibility of these objects within their new context of the main international museums of the world. Next there is an original choreography by Michael Clark, which illustrates some of the equations and concepts of Marx’ Das Kapital. The film then moves between the Negritude movement, Irish Republicanism and the economies of global and artistic production.
Perhaps its original presentation was more forgiving, which began with the more accessible Les Statues Meurent Aussi. Having this older, slower-paced film went a long way in setting up, at a more forgiving pace, the content of It for Others. Yet despite the difficulty of the film, there’s a complicated generosity to the work. While the content and elements of the structure of It for Others make high demands of its audience, there’s no patronising underestimation of the limits of viewers’ concentration or understanding.
Give proper due also to Campbell’s ambition for It for Others to square up to a breadth of issues and concepts from the role of the nation state within the trends of globalisation, to identity politics and the ontologies of race. Across this, as well as in previous works such as Make it New John and Bernadette, Campbell stretches his medium to its limits. Uncompromising, It for Others has received just recognition as a rigourous example of the potential and responsibility of film art as an important tool of critical response.
MORE FROM THE SKINNY:
• Interview: Hayley Tompkins and Corin Sworn on Scotland's Venice Biennale pavilion
• This month in Scottish art – our guide to the best events and openings
• Our top 10 films of 2014 – from troubled pasts to rampaging monsters