Victoria (2007)

Digital Video Installation

Distinguishable guitar music is distorted and subverted in a short loop that unsettles or frustrates the viewer. These feelings are heightened when the viewer is confronted with the visual imagery presented behind the non-descript white boards.

Beams of light work there way across the monitor, giving glimpses into an unknown space. As the audio distorts the viewer is then presented with a grainy image of a figure, lit from behind in a strange location. Immediately the sense of voyeurism is amplified, especially as the figure appears to be female. The viewer, head peering around boards in the corner of a space, finds themselves in the uncomfortable, or perhaps pleasurable position of watching an unknown female figure in a state of undress.

gender is assumed from the title of the piece and the small visual clues presented. However this is not definite, little is given away visually and as the sound is non-diegetic this only serves to further confuse and alienate the viewer. The viewer cannot establish the location, plot or significance of what they have seen, perhaps resulting in emptiness and dissatisfaction.