Words in Movement2014 | HDV | 20mins & 48mins
Developed with Berta Roth | English |
"We are a geography – like a map. Some words go directly into the imagination. We are made up of plenty of segments, we are not a body. We are an intelligent instrument." – Berta Roth.
In this single-channel video and process documentary, Richard Wank repeats the sentence "I haven't had any problems with higher authority" to explore Berta Roth's concept of words in movement. Through this repetition, and through seven physical variations, the work deals with how a sentence of words can be "destroyed" in order to break it down into sounds and to find the subsequent effects of this sound in the muscles. |
VARIATIONS2014 | HDV | 6mins
Developed with Berta Roth | English |
Framing the political act, through absurdity: there is an absurd quality that manifests in the endeavour of Richard. I am interested in images as lasting imprints.
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HEAD ON2013 | HDV | sound | 6min
single-channel |
In a dark gallery strange rituals take place, somewhere between a beauty salon and the National Geographic channel; hands with shiny acrylic nails comb the deep-black hair of a woman who slowly transforms before our eyes.
Is she a starlet, bird or beast? |
THE SWITCH2007 | DV | sound | 12min
single-screen projection in purpose-built box | dimensions variable |
The Switch is an installation in which a medium appears to ‘channel’ deceased individuals to an audience of spectators the camera never shows.
Some of these spectators identify the expressions the medium conveys in trance to be those of family members. Projected inside a rectangular box (similar to that in which sits the medium) with speakers that play the voices of the audience, separate from the box. The effect is a disembodiment between the mimed actions of the medium and the ‘invisible body’ of the audience, who confirm that they see and believe the phenomenon that unfolds. With special thanks to the generosity of Tom and Linda Anderson at Freedom of Spirit, Glasgow, Scotland. |
ALL ABOUT ÉVIKE2005 | DV | 46mins
Dutch, English and Hungarian with English subtitles with Richard Wank |
In 2005 Richard entered into a conversation with Évike and her entourage. Strangely enough, even Rigó, the blackbird who had already started a conversation with Richard, turned out to be one of her gang. The film unravels Richard’s altercation with the reality that he is confronted with.
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Elizabitch2004 | DV | 58mins | Colour
Co-directed with Gary Ward Dutch and English with English subtitles |
A mix of love, sorrow, mysticism and black humour, Elizabitch is a portrait of Elisabeth van Engelen (1946-2009), a mother living in the aftermath of her son’s suicide. Housebound due to asthma, she struggles for breath and life itself as she unravels her story in a lyrical monologue. Are these the ramblings of a drunk or the words of a self-confessed modern-day prophet?
Her undeniable claim that “coincidence does not exist” reinforces the fatefulness she attributes to the people and events in her life. She positions herself as archetypal mother, playing with magic, perception and association. Filmed over a seven-month period, she effectively adopts the filmmakers, banishing the anonymity of the camera as she invites them to record her evocative testimony. This is an intimate look at the loneliness of the ageing process, and the resilience of a woman to continue living with the acceptance that a broken heart can never be healed. |
Healer
2004 | DV | silent | 6min
single-screen projection on cube | dimensions variable |
A man attempts to heal his swollen hand. He sits alone and in silence gently passing one hand over the other. Shifting from close-up to wide, the camera records this private, meditative act.
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Girl in Grass
2003 | DV | sound | 4min
monitor/projection | dimensions variable |
At the side of a field a girl sits bored, listening to the idle chat of bargain hunters. A camera is placed in the grass nearby and the artist makes no effort to hide it. The girl notices this intrusion but is unconcerned. What results is a silent communication between the artist and her subject as the crowd passes by.
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SUNDAY AFTERNOON II2002 | DV | silent | 6min
single-channel projection | dimensions variable |
This performance for camera was made as a response to an newspaper article I read about people found dead in their homes with their pets.
"Sunday Afternoon II (2001) is bathed in the lush colour of a post-war movie and slowed in tempo. A figure lies prone on the floor in a living-room while two dogs, made giant by the ground-level view, insistently lap at her body with their impossibly wet tongues. Lifeless or acquiescent? Corpse or lover? The scene is ambiguous in its cause, unambiguous in its effect: a disquieting conjunction of death and bestial eroticism." – Kate Bush, Photographer’s Gallery (2002) in memory of Boris (1996-2004) and Heidi Williams (1997-2010), creative collaborators, friends and multiple award-winners. |
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In Sunday Afternoon (2001), the artist is seen lying on the floor while her greyhound dog licks and touches her, its legs at first glance resembling an old man’s bony limbs. With its slow pace, the video plays with the uncertain identity of the figures in the grainy, anthropomorphising image. Over a short span of time, the fragmented bodies seem to engage in a gentle, almost erotic entanglement, mixing a physical, almost inhuman intensity with a domestic allure.
in memory of Heidi Williams (1997-2010), creative collaborator, friend and multiple award-winner. Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2001 |
Sunday Afternoon
2000 | DV | silent | 6min
single-channel projection | dimensions variable
single-channel projection | dimensions variable