Dimensions
250 x 290 x 18mm
Part of the Contemporary Artists series.
Stan Douglas is a Canadian artist whose work combines traditional cinematic techniques with new technologies to produce remarkable images, often suggestive of repressed memories and forgotten histories. These visually complex works can vary from dramatic contemporary video portraits, to serene landscapes, to large installations which envelop the viewer in a sensual play of sound and images.
From his early brief dramas for television depicting uncanny suburban encounters, to his spectacular split-screen installation 'Der Sandmann' featured at Documenta X (Kassal, Germany, 1997), Douglas' work is layered with the artist's observations on social alienation and psychological states. The artist is a master at selecting images that evoke entire social and political moments: a free jazz band performing in France suggests the May 1968 generation and its connection with African-American musical freedom; landscape photographs of Nootka Sound, Canada, stir memories of the European conquests of native North Americans.
Douglas is among the most significant artists to have emerged internationally in the 1990s; in 1998 he was a recipient of the Coutts Contemporary Art Foundation Award, Monte Carlo.
Watson surveys the artist's work in relation to late 20th century aesthetics, politics and psychoanalysis, while Thater conducts an in-depth interview on the sources behind Douglas' work. Clover focuses on the fusion of film psychoanalysis and fable in 'Der Sandmann'. The histories and ideas behind the Douglas' works are explained through project descriptions, notes and scripts in the Artist's Writings section, alongside an essay on the teleplays of Samuel Beckett and an interview with curator and critic Lynne Cooke.
'Contemporary Artists' is a series of authoritative and highly illustrated studies of important artists of the late 20th century. Each title offers a comprehensive survey of individual artists' works. Different genres of art writing are contributed by an international spectrum of authors who are leading figures in their fields, ranging from art history and criticism to philosophy, cultural theory and fiction. Each study provides incisive analyses and multiple perspectives on contemporary art and its inspiration. These are essential source books for everyone concerned with art today.
