Double Dummy

This single-screen experimental video work engages with issues of contemporary experimental video art forms and raises questions around languages of representation, and the meanings they carry. Occupying a very particular field that simultaneously deploys both experimental and narrative forms, this methodology produces original results, in that within one piece of work, Thomas creates highly unusual juxtapositions of art forms and filmic /TV genres, through which she raises a number of questions about conventions of representing truth and meaning, using the moving image.

‘Double Dummy’ investigates ideas of difference, mirroring and subjectivity, through various visual analogies that suggest both a psychological, cultural and philosophical reading. By using a combination of split-screen technology, image decay, the narrative motif of a woman, an almost identical stuffed dummy and a band of colour that evokes a painterly sense of the sublime, the traditional conceits of filmic space and what it can represent are questioned. Punctuated by an absurd love story between a ball of hair and a site-specific sculpture, in a (subtitled) dialogue of words across another split screen, the comparison between these visually similar (but culturally very dissimilar) materials and forms, underlines Thomas' enquiry into the power of genre and status to evoke an impression of meaning.

‘Double Dummy’ has been exhibited at major international experimental film venues including screenings at MOMA, New York; Anthology Film Archives, New York; Feminale Cologne; and the ICA London. It was invited to be part of the European Media Arts Festival ‘Global Visions' initiative, showing at fourteen venues across Germany, France, Italy and north America, and by the 'Rencontres Internationales Paris/Berlin' festival for their PULSAR touring project, sponsored by the Goethe Institute, The British Council, and The Alliance Française. In 2005 it was requested by Video Data Bank for inclusion in their international distribution catalogue.