The theme seems weighty and serious: spirituality, life and death. However, Reeves's exhortation to watch this video is ironic enough to give here: "Guaranteed to change your life, or your money back in your next life." The work seems to be an attempt to answer the big questions of life, tied to an intelligent recap of Zen Buddhism. The inimitable humour of this video is a synthesis of east and west: the twinkling eyes of the smiling Buddha, the secret amusement of some haikus and the absurdity of Monty Python. Reeves juggles with the meanings of words and images as though it is nothing. He edits his material like a Dadaist collage artist après-la-lettre and at the same time knows how to hold onto the video poetry he is so familiar with. Just as the title can have a higher spiritual meaning, while also alluding to something as banal as a hot dog, so he mocks a murmuring monk with the on-and-off blinking text: 'ACTUAL MONK'. Reeves is known for his engaged and lyrical work in which he visualizes poetical texts and weaves together the different ways in which people listen to and look at the world. In this he makes the most of the continually developing technical possibilities of editing. Reeves travelled widely throughout Asia and the influence of eastern philosophy and religion can be seen in many of his videos. His experiences as a soldier in Vietnam were the driving force behind his first videos. The most well-known, 'Smothering Dreams' (1981), came as a bombshell and won three Emmy Awards. Since then the leitmotiv running through Reeves's work has been what he himself calls 'the big question': the question of life and death. For those who are not familiar with his other work, this places 'One With Everything' in perspective: to what extent is humour a mechanism of survival? The video gives the answer to this as well as to other pressing questions such as: what is the sound of one hand clapping? Where does the soul go after lunch? And: does a dog have the nature of Buddha?
– Lies Holtrop
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With: David Richmond, Sean Kilcoyne, Production: Shakti/Total Loss Films
Daniel Reeves ° 1948, Washington DC (USA)
Lives and works in Argyll (Scotland)
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