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FACT - 'Echo'

I went to FACT today for the first time. They're currently showing a Mark Boulos retrospective. There were several film installations that included 3 earlier pieces in which he was exploring the "possibilities and limitations of documentary filmaking", but the one that stood out to me was 'Echo' - 2013, a complete contrast to his earlier work.

As you step in to the gallery viewing space, there is a singular spotlight with the intent for the audience to step under it. It then brilliantly relfects a translucent, ghostly image of yourself in to a video installation of the busy centre of London.

It isn't simply a mirror image though, as the film plays on your character becomes strange and develops delayed movement and an unsteady echo. The changes in the film itself are encapsulated physically through your own behaviour, well this was definitely the case for me as began to feel almost disembodied or displaced, the experience created a feeling of detachment, and left me slightly uneasy.

I think it's a brilliant piece of work and I really want to go back again to get another feel for it as I myself would quite like to start looking at the concepts of disembodiment and alienation.

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Tate Liverpool

I began with the Chagall exhibition and from the contrast that came with both 'Birth' 1910 and 1911 I was optimistic and excited about the diversity of the work I was going to see. As I circled round (not really in order as I thought the curation of the exhibition to be quite chaotic - maybe that itself was done purposefully?) It led me to relate different aspects of his work with other artists. I made comparisons with the likes of Matisse, Kandinsky and Davinci which in turn integrated in to the idea that his work holds a lot of confusion, maddness and 'giddiness' (often pointed out in the blurbs of the work) both technically and with the concepts he explored.

Although I thouroughly enjoyed it, I found the exhibiton quite challenging because I often feel seeing work by artists as accomplished as Chagall quite intimidating in the sense that I'm obligated to take as much as I possibly can away from the exhibition.

So when I went downstairs and made my way to Marina Abramović's Rhythm 0, I felt almost relieved (although there isn't really much relief you can feel watching a woman being tormented and tortured) that I could connect more with her work. The element of shock is still so resonant even 30 years post making the performance and because it was so brilliantly thought - provoking I left inspired being able to relate it back to the concepts of disfigurement, distortion and social perception in which I have, over the past year, begun to explore.