Stan Douglas | Hors-champs

Stan Douglas (b. 1960, Vancouver, Canada) works in film, photography, and installation. Within his practice, he investigates the context of history, considers alternative narratives, and examines the intersections between race, class, and power. He gained international acclaim in 1992, when he premiered his first multichannel video installation, Hors-champs, at Documenta, a highly regarded exhibition of contemporary art presented every five years in Kassel, Germany. Hors-champs, which translates from French as “off-screen” or “off-camera,” is simultaneously a work of fiction and a document of a performance. Projected on opposite sides of a suspended screen, it features Douglas Ewart (saxophone), George Lewis (trombone), Kent Carter (bass), and Oliver Johnson (drums). The quartet riffs on Albert Ayler’s Spirits Rejoice (1965), a composition that incorporates reworked passages from the French and US national anthems while also drawing on gospel, military fanfare, and other musical traditions. 

Hors-champs was filmed to resemble French television of the 1960s. On one side of the screen, a polished, made-for-TV edit plays, while the other displays footage that typically is omitted. The performers play free jazz, which dispenses with such musical conventions as harmonies, chord progressions, and regular tempos. When it originated in the late 1950s, free jazz was linked with political activism, particularly in Paris, where a number of Black US musicians lived in self-imposed exile.

By showcasing what is typically off-screen, Douglas gives us access to moments such as the musicians intently listening and responding to the instrumental language of their peers. While the music is synchronized, it is impossible to observe the two channels simultaneously, and so Douglas invites us to move between the two sides of the screen, effectively improvising our experience of the work in a way that mirrors the music itself. As he has explained, “Seeing everything isn’t really the point. The point is getting to the place where you understand the logic, the atmosphere of the piece.”

Stan Douglas | Hors-champs is curated by Sarah Humphreville, Lunder Curator of American Art, and Taka Suzuki, Assistant Professor of Art.