Output details

Dad's Stick

This five-minute video work features three objects that were shown to the artist by his father shortly before he died. Focusing on these artefacts and events relating to their history, the film investigates the ambiguity of images and words through the juxtaposition of selectively framed close-up images and printed captions. By these means, the work seeks to both construct and subvert narrative threads and to shift the interpretation of images between abstracted and representational readings. Dad’s Stick explores the contradictions of memory in order to hint at the character of a dead father and to underscore his complex relationship with his son.

Dad’s Stick was commissioned by Frieze Foundation (£3,000) for Frieze Film and Channel 4 Television and broadcast on Channel 4, ‘Random Acts’ series (22 March 2013) and shown at the Frieze Art Fair, London (11-14 October 2012).

The work has been exhibited in the exhibition ‘Object Lessons’ at Tanya Leighton Gallery, Berlin (2013) and screened at the Rotterdam Film Festival, Netherlands (2013), Ann Arbor Film Festival, USA (2013), New York Film Festival (2013), ‘Images’ Festival, Toronto (2013) , ‘IndieLisboa’ Festival, Lisbon (2013), ‘VideoEx’ Experimental Film and Video, Zurich (2013), Hamburg International Short Film Festival (2013), IndieCork Film Festival (2013), Lima International Film Festival (2013), ‘New Horizons’ Film Festival, Wroclaw (2013), Viennale Film Festival, Vienna (2013) and the Mar del Plata International Film Festival, Buenos Aires (2013). See http://www.johnsmithfilms.com/texts/upcoming.html and http://www.tanyaleighton.com/index.php?pageId=528&l=en

Dad's Stick was awarded the ‘Jean Vigo’ Prize for Best Director,Punto de Vista 8th International Film Festival of Navarra, Pamplona, Spain, 2013, (£4500) and the 2013 Film London Jarman Award (£10,000).

See: http://www.puntodevistafestival.com/en/noticias.asp?IdNoticia=279 and the ARTE Award for European Short Film at the Oberhausen International Short Film Festival, Germany, 2013 (2,100). See http://www.kurzfilmtage.de/en/metanavigation/press/press-releases/latest/die-preistraeger-der-59-kurzfilmtage.html

It was purchased for the collection of Kunstmuseum Kloster Unser Lieben Frauen, Magdeburg (2013).