THE LAST OF ENGLAND
England and US | 2002 | colour | 30 mins
Photography by Antar Abderrahman, James Scott
Associate Editor: Robert Welkner
Original Score composed and performed by Jim Howard
Additional Music: “Westminster Waltz” by Robert Farnon, “Dambusters March” by Arnold Coates
Conceived, directed, and produced by James Scott
Like an embryo dividing, the project now became two pieces. The flag had asserted itself so clearly, there was no way for me, nor need anymore, to append the Sisyphus tiles or the figurines. This new piece would be like a brother or a sister. An accompaniment. The tiles would cover the entire area. But now I was left with the question, “what would the tiles be set in?” This was soon answered as I explored the different mediums. I was looking for something thick, impasto, where the tiles could be embedded. In terms of color, I was looking for an all-embracing background that would give cohesiveness to the tiles. And then as I worked on this surface again, I began to treat it as though it was the receptacle of fossils, imprints, impressions from long ago. Bringing back the circle was still my concern, but now I saw the circle more in the form of a spiral, an ancient Celtic symbol. This began to represent for me the Irish side of my past, the side which had been obliterated for so long.
As I worked on this project, layer upon layer seemed to come out of it. And now I began thinking of it in kinetic terms, even sounds became important. I began to see The Last of England as an installation rather than a group of paintings. The third dimension as well as the element of time had been part of it almost from the inception with the dancing figurines. What I needed to do now was to include actual time and sound.
This I saw as a video that would begin from the painting itself. I imagined the camera, just inches away from the surface, traveling slowly, almost scanning the terrain. An unbroken movement. And as this journey continued, sounds would be heard. First of all the droning and buzzing of helicopters, then more pastoral sounds, church bells, old English dance music, and a variety of voices, accents, regional as well as class, making a cacophony of sounds.
In the last year I have been drawn back to England physically. In April my mother died. In July we spread her ashes on my father’s grave in Enniskillen. In October my brother was married. I began to see that these events, these visits, would actually form a part of The Last of England video. The painting would connect to the experience of these visits. The video that I took while traveling would be composed of picture bites, or rather, sound and picture bites on average no longer than two or three seconds each. And these bites would then be integrated with the continuously traveling shot of The Last of England painting itself. Thus bringing the whole experience full circle.
-James Scott - November 1999
