watch: no sex last night aka double-blind

French conceptual artist Sophie Calle joins with Gregory Shephard to create a voyeuristic tour de force. Armed with camcorders, Calle and her collaborator/partner Shephard head West in his Cadillac convertible to produce and document a real-life narrative of their journey and their relationship. With America as the backdrop for this unconventional coast-to-coast road movie, Calle and Shephard each narrates and records a personal diary, presenting strikingly different versions of the narrative/relationship. Aiming their dueling camcorders, the protagonists chronicle the elusive landscapes of human relations, wrestling to reconcile self, sexuality, and desire. The viewer is challenged to reconsider the subjective and cultural roles imposed by gender, sexuality, power, and tradition. Throughout, Calle seeks to redefine through personal investigation the terms and parameters of subject/object, public/private, truth, fiction, and role-playing. The quasi-documentary style evokes the films of Chris Marker, to whom Double-Blind is dedicated.

browsing through ubu's videos i noticed Sophie Calle's name. being a fan of her work and not knowing of her video work i decided to check it out. well worth the watch. super interesting relationship dynamics. the two hardly know each other but set off on a long adventure together hoping to figure out their relationship and each having vastly different understandings of it.

very humanizing to see somewhat into Calle's real life instead of just thinking of the artist as a remote idea. someone somewhere else, in another world practically whose work just shows up and is consumed.