2004

16mm film, 7 mins 30 secs, looped, with soundtrack

This slow-motion film was made in Port Glasgow with the co-operation of a local school. It records a sports day, and couples it with the soundtrack from ‘Kes’, the 1969 film by Ken Loach ( a film that also features an emotional scene on a sports field). The footage seems historically vague, as if it could have been shot at any time over the past forty years, an impression further re-enforced through association with ‘Kes’  The work implies that conditions amongst working communities have not changed in four decades. The use of high-speed cinematography and sentimental music also suggests that social documentary techniques can only hope to aestheticise their subject matter.