*Framed at a (relative) distance:
Helene Black’s re-presentation of a woman at the margins*
by Dr Antonis Danos
Among those prohibited from Western representation, whose representations are denied all legitimacy, are women. [They are] excluded from representation by its very structure [absolutely centered, unitary, masculine]… This prohibition bears primarily on woman as the subject and rarely as the object of representation, for there is no shortage of images of women.
Craig Owens, “The Discourse of Others: Feminists and Postmodernism”.1
Helene Black’s two-part video, Relative Distance, deals with issues of individual (versus collective) identity, marginalization and displacement, social and moral hegemonic discourses, the relation-reaction between private and public spaces, and personal claims over either spheres. It raises, moreover, issues of representation – hegemonic structures of (re)presenting the Other versus artists’ intentions at facilitating counter-discourses of marginality: (here) the disenfranchised individual (re)presenting herself.
In the first part of the work, “Mrs Niki”, a woman in her seventies, is being interviewed, or rather she is offering a narrative of her life. She is shown sitting in her living room, in front of a wall decorated with “artistically” coloured-over, studio photo portraits, mostly of herself. A series of these photos, showing her in her twenties, parade along the screen at the beginning of the video – framed, posed images of a woman’s past, re-framed by another woman’s camera. The past draws, like a curtain, to allow its recounting in the present.
We are told of a young child leaving her village; of a brutal childhood with a new family; of running away… Of a marriage, at the age of fourteen, to a “man” only six months older than her. Of his gambling and drinking, of other women, of beatings… Of her daughter, whom Mrs Niki has not seen or spoken to in forty years.
Visually, the narrative unfolds via three camera view-points: two three-quarter view, steady cameras, capturing the “protagonist” waist up, one at her left and the other at her right. A third one interposes with close-ups of her face. Although the editing process has apparently utilised up-to-date, sophisticated technical means, the video has been constructed to look like an amateur “home movie”, in terms of lighting, camera work, and colour. It retains “local” colours, no “artificial” (camera-related) lighting is used, while occasional exterior sounds – such as, of passing cars – intercept the sound of the woman’s voice. It all aims at creating as much of an “authentic” picture of Mrs Niki’s private space, as possible.
The presentation lasts about nine and a half minutes, which have been edited out of three hours (three one-hour tapes) of filming. Black has aimed at an “equal” subject-object relationship, and at concentrating “on content rather than form.” Moreover, the absence – at least, in the edited material – of her own involvement (both in audio and visual terms) in the interview, purports to allow Mrs Niki to project freely an image of herself, as she, presumably, sees fit.2
Mrs Niki’s real name is Aphrodite. She did not want to be called that, and she adopted “Niki”. A gesture of contempt toward the people who gave her up, those who mistreated her, and a society that systematically marginalized her? There is a certain irony: Aphrodite, the Greek goddess born on the shores of Cyprus, was the goddess of Eros, of sexual, physical love. The name figures prominently in contemporary, collective self-projecting images of Cyprus as a dream-place holiday destination, where (mostly northern and western) tourists can enjoy the sun, the sea and, presumably, sex. Interestingly, Mrs Niki spent most of her adult life as a “follower” of goddess Aphrodite: she is a former prostitute.
“Niki”, on the other hand, is a more common, almost mundane name. Its meaning – “victory” – tempts one to imbue the act of renaming herself with a subconscious desire, on the part of Mrs Niki, of proclaiming her survival against all odds. However, nowhere in her self-narration does she talk of her former profession. It is not part of the picture she wants to paint for herself:3 a conscious attempt, on the part of a woman in society’s margins, to control at least her “public” image, or evidence of submission to this society’s hegemonic ideology?
The second part of the Relative Distance video is an effort, by the artist, to offer a more “objective” narrative on Mrs Niki. The viewpoint is from high above: a camera fixed on a balcony, across from Niki’s home, looking down on the street, on the space where she has spent the greatest part of her time, since “retirement”.
Filming took place over the period of a month; the material has been edited into a twenty-one-minute video. The editing is in the form of transitions, thus allowing for a seemingly seamless flow of time (there is no sound in this part of the work). All in all, very little happens: most of the time, Mrs Niki is sitting on a chair at the side of the street, basking in the sun, almost motionless, smoking, bending down, her bright-red hair in sharp contrast to the green-greyish colour of the road’s surface. Occasionally, she is shown sweeping the street. A few interactions with passers-by serve only to accentuate the feeling of loneliness, which permeates the entire duration of the video.
These two parts of Relative Distance may be seen as negotiations of the problem of representation: a marginalized woman’s projection of a self image, and another woman’s (the artist’s) framing of that projection, especially, as an effort to offer a counter-hegemonic (representational) discourse. Black allows Mrs Niki to “dictate” the interview part (though, of course, real control lies with the framing, editing artist); however, the latter shies away from giving a complete picture of herself, abiding by dominant ideology’s notions of (im)propriety and (im)morality, with regard to her former “occupation”.
Any allowance for the possibility of Mrs Niki empowering herself, in terms of controlling her projected image, is undermined, at least, discursively, by Black’s stated intention of providing a “truer” representation of Mrs Niki, in the second part of the work. The sense of the artist’s detachment is reinforced by the completely static positioning of the camera, fixed high above, at about a 75-degree angle from the picture plane, keeping a “relative distance”, between the observer and the observed. What, however, was intended as a sympathetic narrative of a marginalized person’s predicament (her “physical disengagement from society to protect herself,” according to the artist) is actually recording her effort at demanding what she has been deprived of: Mrs Niki’s long-hours inhabiting of outdoors space constitutes her claim on society, on the public sphere of social interaction. Her present social involvement is (or she wishes it to be) on an “equal” basis, unlike the former provision of sexual services, which has firmly placed her on the margins of society, in an unprivileged segment of the collective ground, one that is simultaneously public and private.
The “common” space that she has claimed, however, is little more than a continuation of her private one; it functions as an extension of her living room, which has long been empty of “guests”. The formal setting of the video image reinforces this: it is framed as to resemble a static composition, rather than a filmed narrative. The ground is dramatically tilted, like in an old Japanese painting, which was meant to offer greater viewing range of household interiors-turned exteriors, blurring the distinction between public and private (and removing, in the process, walls and ceilings).
Mrs Niki’s isolation and marginalization remain steadfast. She occupies a segment of a little street that, at best, exists at the margins of the public realm; a few cars and people pass occasionally, but little else happens. Although out here, society is brushing her by, she is, at the same time, kept at a (relative) distance.