Forced Reaction
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- Forced Reaction
- Reakcja wymuszona
- 1976
- video, color, sound, transferred from 16 mm film
- 1min, 20sec
“Forced Reaction” is a film made in the streets of Warsaw, where passersby were confronted with the camera. The artist employed two cameramen, with one always filming said passersby and the other training his objective on the work of his colleague. The viewer therefore sees the point of view of the camera playing the first role as well as its interaction with the confronted individuals as captured by camera playing the second. Jolanta Marcolla described this project in light of the invasion of privacy taking place in the public sphere: “Coercion and confrontation as effects of actions by an aggressive camera in real conditions in the first part of the film are juxtaposed in its second part with forced repetitions of a shot using the formal procedure of copying and editing a fragment of the film stock.” It is hence with repetitions of a short take showing a woman adjusting her hair—an obvious sign of the disciplinary effect of the camera’s presence—that the film concludes. D.M.