Disembodied — Sophie Standford Website

Sophie
Standford
About
A Rural Idyll
In the Forest Garden
Inner Landscapes
Absent Presence
Trace
On paper
In sound

Disembodied; Nude at the Window

Super-8mm black and white film 1’03” silent, 1994
transfer to HD video
Group show
Performance: 4 hours
Super-8mm camera: Sasha Koura
Sponsorship: Paul Mitchell
Location: The Tannery,
Bermondsey, London

Washing her hair crouched over a bowl of water of various durations is a performance that the artist has come to repeat in variety of different places. It is the chosen location that gives meaning and context to this simple, routine action.

Disembodied took place in an old warehouse in South London...the room is filled with the decay and detritus of abandonment awaiting development; the sun shines in brightly from the open doorway into an otherwise dark space.

The artist performs the act of washing her hair for 4 hours continuously. The white aroma of shampoo gently creeping away from the impromptu bowl on the floor. Visitors eventually have to step over the creeping foam, and they gather to watch from seated positions on the floor around her. Then she left, leaving behind a space quietly transformed by her presence.

The black and white Super-8mm film captures my presence like a smear, looming out of the ghostly gloom.

At the point where proximity and distance lie
giving life to the stark white foam, encroaching
bearing its sweet aroma beyond
enticing you in through the open doorway.
Passing through transience
engaging with timelessness.

You are confronted by a familiar action that is out of context; where time is compressed and all the life in between is elsewhere. A doorway from the bright sunshine outside leads you into this bare dust-filled room, which is otherwise quite dark. A past of activity reiterates, as it waits for new life in refurbishment.

A figure in the far corner transfixes the image of a painting, washing her hair over a single bowl of water. The weathered grit and mould of the room's disuse become buoyant with aromatic foam, spilling a presence into absence.

Paul Mitchell Shampoo-One: Chamomile extract, (deionised water/chamomile blend), sodium laureate sulphate (derived from coconut), cocamide dea, sodium chloride, cocamidopropyl betaine awapuhi extract, rosemary extract, jojoba oil, kelp extract, aloe vera gel, wheat germ oil, keratin amino acids, polyquaternium-28, henna extract, panthenol, hydroxypropyl, methylcellulose, methylparaben, terasodium edta, fragrance, critic acid, methylchloroisothiazlinone, methylisothiazolinone.