Douglas Gordon's: Twenty-four hour psycho

 Douglas Gordon is a film artist/photographer whom I really admire. A lot of his video work uses found footage and he often distorts the footage with repetition, enlargements and slow motion. He seems to have followed in Duchamp’s ‘ready-made’ footsteps and often creates cinematic ready-mades (Martin, 2006.) Twenty-four hour psycho (1993) is probably his best know piece of work, and perhaps my favourite, even though i haven't seen it in person, as I love Alfred Hitchcock. In this piece Gordon plays with the element of time, and slows Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960) down so that it lasts a whole day, or twenty-four hours. The piece was installed as a freestanding projection, rather than simply projected onto a wall, giving the viewer the option of where to view it, completely changing how the film affects the viewer. As Martin suggests, by staging the work this way, it is ‘Unavoidable for them to appear now and again as shadows on the screen – just as, in every one of his films, Hitchcock has a tiny guest appearance.’ (Martin, 2006, p.52.) I think this is brilliant, as artists we are always trying to challenge the audience to perceive our art in new ways; Gordon achieves this with a touch of irony too. Assuming that the viewer is not going to stay and watch the whole 24 hours of this work, means that it encourages their memory to play a part in their perception of the piece. Again assuming that the audience is familiar with Hitchcock’s Psycho, the piece forces them to ‘mentally add foregoing and succeeding events to the moment of viewing the image- that is, completing the story either before or after it has taken place on screen.’ (Martin, 2006, p.52.) Time is one of the most important elements in film and I think the way Gordon plays with it is particularly clever and unique. We have recently had to complete a found footage project in moving image, and I would have never thought to do something so daring. Douglas Gordon has really challenged how I view film art, and has inspired me into realising you really can do anything with it.

'24 Hour Psycho, as I see it, is not simply a work of appropriation. It is more like an act of affiliation... it wasn't a straightforward case of abduction. The original work is a masterpiece in its own right, and I've always loved to watch it. [...] I wanted to maintain the authorship of Hitchcock so that when an audience would see my 24 Hour Psycho they would think much more about Hitchcock and much less, or not at all, about me...'  -  Douglas Gordon. (Tranter, 2007)

References:

Gordon, D. (1993) Twenty-Four Hour Psycho [Installation.] Hayward Gallery, London. 2002-3.

Martin, S. (2006.) Video Art. Cologne, Germany: Taschen.

Psycho (1960) Directed by Alfred Hitchcock [Film]. USA: Shamley Productions.

Tranter, R. (2007.) 'Douglas Gordon, 24 hour psycho', A Piece of Monologue, 5 March 2010. Available at: http://www.apieceofmonologue.com/2010/03/douglas-gordon-24-hour-psycho.html  (Accessed: 14 April 2012).