RUN

The following was written early last year for a Spanish newspaper to coincide with his exhibition at MACBA ( Museum of Contemporary Art Barcelona ). They edited using only what I had written about his short video works. What is written about the “Run” video was used as program notes at the museum.

ROBERT FRANK

To understand Robert Frank's fil ms (including videos) is to know Robert Frank. That does not mean that one need to have met him, because he hi ms elf is so present in his work.

Robert Frank's fil ms are the work of an amateur. He is like the Elephant child of Kipling with 'satiable curiosity, full of wonder, looking out on to the world, finding his way, recording the sights and the sounds, a sense of place and time, that eventually tells a story, and then we, the audience, are invited inside.

While we hear about today's “digital revolution”, it is important to note that there were “pioneers” that came before, quite recently in fact. Filmmakers such as Frank who moved in to video for practical reasons. I am thinking of Alain Cavalier, Agnes Varda and, especially, Chris Marker. As they had each made many fil ms and struggled, as most filmmakers still do, with budget, crews, equipment, laboratories, producers…all taking time, precious time, away from the ongoing drive to simply make a film. Alas, video allowed them to shut the door, ignore the phone, and get to work. These are the true pioneers to whom the new filmmakers (young and old) must look, for they did not follow a trend. But neither did they forge ahead as heroes. They just kept on walking, and keep on walking. And we are lucky to walk with them.

When I first saw Robert's “The Present”, screened for a photography class at New York University , I laughed, and I cried. I was so moved that I encouraged Robert to have the video converted in to a 35mm print so that it could be screened to a wider audience, such as in film festivals.

I have since seen “ Paper Route ” and his most recent video “True Story”. What I find here is a trilogy of sorts, but most interesting is that its trajectory is backwards, but moves in to the future.

“The Present” begins with Robert “looking for a story”. It becomes the story of the end of Robert's life. What echoes in the mind is the repeated phrase, “and put my negatives away”. All of the material is shot in “the present” of that time (1997/8?). It is a kind of putting things in order at the end of one's life. Then came “Paper Route”, an extension of “the Present” that is simpler, a kind of walk (in this case a ride) in the car of a man who delivers the newspapers in Mabou (Nova Scotia) where Robert spends a lot of time. They follow a routine and move in a circle as if suspended in time.

But now look at “True Story” and you find a mix of past and present, film and video. Robert is going forward by moving backwards, and it is less of a putting in order than a positive move ahead. There is a new life and it comes from reaching back in to the past, grabbing things (memories as found in objects and images) and pulling them in to the present. Robert speaks of the deterioration of the body, and of nature. For example, there is the scene of making a crutch for an old tree. While he says “it's a grim picture” (I have to think of Samuel Beckett), Robert see ms to be saying that everything is possible to carry on, we just have to observe and to care, to give a helping hand, in order to make certain that it will be possible. It is our responsibility, and our joy. So there is joy in Robert's new work, and there is silence. Because in silence we, the audience, can reflect. He is providing us with that crutch.

I have worked with Robert, twice. Both times as a producer of music videos (“clips”), one for the British band New Order (“Run”) and the other for the poet/singer Patti Smith (“Summer Cannibals”).

Years before meeting Robert I had been in his house on New York 's Bleecker Street to visit the artist Terry Fox who was living there amongst cardboard boxes filled with Robert's photographs. This was in 1976/7. The house was also a home to some homeless men (perhaps women as well, but I don't recall seeing any). Robert is like that: he has great compassion for his fellow man, and he's willing to live his belief.

I had been familiar with Robert's photographs, especially his quietly epic book “The Americans”, as well as his legendary beat film “Pull My Daisy”. One day in 1987(?) I knocked on Robert's door to see if he might consider directing a music video for New Order. Of course he did not know the band, and I did not even expect him to like the music. This did not concern me. What I could offer Robert was a small budget and the freedom to do as he pleased. The last thing I wanted was for Robert to even attempt to make a “music video” as defined by the music industry. It took some time before Robert agreed to make the video, and I fondly recall his relating that his positive answer came while taking a shower!

Unlike other people in my position – professionally referred to as “video commissioners” - I did not require a written proposal. In fact I had no idea what Robert would do.

To begin we bought a new video camera (at that time the new standard was Hi8), and we flew out to Southern California where New Order was performing. The first stage of the production was at the concert. Robert disappeared. I did not see him again until after the show.

Perhaps it was the following morning that I had arranged for

Robert to take individual portraits (photographs) of the band. It really could have been any morning - they were young (me too!), and it was rock and roll. None of the band enjoyed the early rendezvous (note the singer Bernard Sumner's portrait made in the hotel's underground car park - he best represents the early hour after a night on tour…). That was stage two.

Stage three was in New York . Willia ms burg , to be precise. A scenario had been developing in Robert's mind, perhaps influenced or confirmed by the trip to meet the band. We assembled a cast of the actor David Warrilow and a young girl.

Warrilow had been a member of the theater group Mabou Mines, and I might excitedly note that he was also a revered actor of the plays of Samuel Beckett. Beckett even wrote a play for Mr. Warrilow. The young girl was the daughter of a friend of Robert's, Tony Noguera, a Brazilian percussionist. To give a twist in texture to the video, we decided to shoot this sequence on 35mm film. It would differentiate it from the video footage of the concert.

The result of the video for “Run” was constructed in the edit with Laura Israel (this began a special and continuing relationship between Laura and Robert who work together on all moving image projects that Robert makes). There was no script for Laura to follow, and no “sync” performance of the band to the song. So it was the material itself that had to be “read”. I learned so much from this experience.

What is the video in the end? The band's performance is embedded within the performances of Mr. Warrilow and the young girl. What have they to do with one another? Nothing. And Everything. For me the video is a dance – the movement of the musicians separated from the music itself, “observed”, and played against the movement of the young girl playing her drum, twirling, dancing.

In between is the older man - so “of” his moment. He finds his place: a chair and a table. Approaches and takes his seat. It is not a restaurant, but rather the parking lot of a disused service station (gas station for cars). There are no other tables.

The man sits. He reflects. Something comes to mind that makes him laugh. He catches hi ms elf and looks directly in to the camera, at us, then returns to his little place. He notices the plant and checks to see if it has water. He rubs his fingers together to feel for the level

of moisture. Only then is his proximity to the girl revealed. She is nearby, in the street. They never meet. She never even notices him, but he does her. He sees everything, in a sense. And, in a sense, he is Robert Frank.

Frank can only be of his time - the moment Walter Benjamin spoke of that, as soon as it is recognized, is past. History. Robert is history in the truest sense. We walk in his shoes. That's it: Robert walks his camera, which is why the work is so grounded. And the work begins with the walk, not before. There does not appear to be any plan that

he is after.

- Michael H. Shamberg, January 2005.