I was thinking about the contradiction between wanting to be seen and being afraid of exposure. To connect with someone, you have to become vulnerable, exposed in some way, and that is what makes closeness both difficult and appealing. With this in mind, I worked with Ashley, a dancer with ballet training, on a series of movements that don’t really include dance. In one work, she hides behind a tree and briefly peeks out; in the other, she sits at a table, jumps under it when the viewer approaches, and comes back out when the viewer moves away. These actions became the basis for two interactive video works, set in two contrasting spaces: one inside the home, the other outside among the trees. In both works, the interaction becomes a kind of game: Ashley seems to invite the viewer closer, then quickly slips away.

“In Ashley I, a woman peers from behind a tree, then hides as you approach. Filippova's fascination with this particular tree came from her discovery of a near-identical tree in a Constable painting at a Lucian Freud exhibition, itself a trace of Freud's lifelong obsession with the same subject. In Ashley II, a woman crawls slowly from beneath a kitchen table, and quickly hides as you approach. Both pieces draw on the eerie domesticity of Vilhelm Hammershøi, and on the blurred, refused clarity of Gerhard Richter's October 18, 1977”.
Sophia Hallstrom

Performer: Ashley Shukman

Creative technologist: Anton Tolchanov