Douglas Gordon

Lisson Gallery, London
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner in 1994

A Souvenir of Non-Existence is a classic early example of Douglas Gordon’s investigation into the thin line between fiction and reality. Using a variety of media, from film, photography, performance and the printed word, dialogue is the primary motif in his work and it is fundamentally rooted in a desire for social exchange, between artist and viewer, between individuals or opposing concepts. Out of this he seeks to bring about a third, less finite position, generated in the space between the two, from which either extreme can be seen anew. Executed in the same year as arguably his most renowned work, 24 Hour Psycho, here Gordon adopts another renowned Hitchcock film as the basis for an investigation into the space that exists in our minds between the created fictions in our culture and the reality that surrounds us.

This time, his medium is the film Rear Window, whose narrative revolves around themes of voyeurism and suspense. Confined to his apartment due to a broken leg, James Stewart’s character Jeffries spends his days spying on his neighbors in the block of apartments opposite. All sorts of mini narratives take place during the film which itself tries to re-enact the reality of neighbourhood life. In one of the narratives, Lars Thorwald is suspected of murdering his wife, who mysteriously disappears at the beginning of the film. Gordon slipped into this fiction and treated it as reality, as he typed a letter to Thorwald asking “What have you done with her?” and sent it to the address in the film. Of course the letter came back as a return to sender and what we are left with is a souvenir of of this moment where fiction and reality blur. Presented in a framed set, we have the letter, the returned envelope and a still from the film of Lars Thorwald supposedly in the act. The title emphasizes the interaction between a real human being, the artist and a character from a film in an extremely simple act which carries a profundity and poetry which run far deeper than the work itself.