A R C H I E F1 9 9 6  
.14
  Andrew Stones
Colonial difficulties
  UK 1995
Videotape, 13:20, colour, mono
Who doesn’t remember the endless performances in which friends or family show their slides to victims slouching further and further? It seemed to be the zenith of bad entertainment, but the discovery of the compact video camera, with its zoom lens, has produced an even more exquisite variation. Slides, once the eternal focussing had ceased, were at least static. In ten chapters, Stones reports a trip to Australia. ‘Colonial difficulties’ should be required viewing for everyone who wants to impose an audio visual report of his impressive / spectacular / unique travels on his nearest and dearest. It can be as good as this! Right from the departure from an inevitably rainy England, waving goodbye through steamed-up windscreens, a wonderful, now and then humorous, report unfurls. Australian nature is indeed impressive / spectacular / et cetera. Leading roles are reserved for flies on the lens and snake trails in the sand. What’s more, the chapters have mouth-watering titles: Promises of Sweetness, The Suggestion that a New World awaits, No Tigers, Bad Dreams and - with a clever nod to Bruce Chatwin - What are you doing here? The return to the trusted, absolutely less-impressive England could not have been easy for Stones, but having a tape like this must have made up for a lot.

Erik Daams

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