Colonial Difficulties is a post-colonial travelogue in ten short sketches:
THE STATE OF AFFAIRS AT HOME
STAINS
PROMISES OF SWEETNESS
SEEN-A-THOUSAND-TIMES TRAVELOGUE SHOTS
WEIGHT OF NUMBERS
THE SUGGESTION THAT ANOTHER WORLD AWAITS
NO TIGERS
BAD DREAMS
WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?
CALLS (WITHOUT REPLIES)
First, the camera takes in a forlorn stretch of British coastline before intruding into the ex-colonial territory of Australia via footage shot around Uluru (Ayer's Rock); in the Central Australian Desert; and in the McDonnell Ranges west of Alice Springs. For the visitor familiar with the cultural clutter of Britain the immediately striking thing about these territories is the sheer force of open space; the apparent emptiness. But whilst native and implanted animals are easily found in beautiful, affecting terrains, native culture evades scrutiny. The tape centres on the difficulty of using a camera in these places, and shares certain concerns with the installation work After Tom Brown's Schooldays (1993)
The collection of images by the tourist reflects the modus operandi of the 19th-century naturalist and anthropologist, collecting and (re)naming what is 'new' only in relation to European norms. Indigenous modes of classification or historical record are often carried in oral tradition, ritual, and song - thus easily consigned to the curiosity shop of the 'primitive'. Today, at certain sacred sites in Central Australia signs requesting 'no photographs' serve to reinforce a general sense that the Western gaze alone is invasive. In questioning the precedents for our arrival, mobility, and ability to take away images, the fantasy of easy familiarity with a spacious, optimistic (and White) Australia; a destination for Britons seeking a 'fresh start', begins to evaporate.
Colonial Difficulties is bookended by the appearance of a laughable fairground version of a bird common to Australia; a parrot, and includes a scene in which a bird whistle calls from the camera into the Australian bush, obtaining no reply. The bird whistle is marketed in Australian 'Wilderness' shops under the trade name Audubon, after the author of "The Birds of North America", a famous illustrated work of classification which arose out of the earlier colonisation of the Americas.
Andrew Stones 1996
Production details
Colonial Difficulties was a self-funded project, shot on location on Hi-8 and edited on D3 digital
Thanks to the following for equipment loan, accommodation and other support in Australia:
Carey Lai, Patricia Hegarty, Martin Fox, Wendy Reeve, Fiona Eagger, Brendan Lavelle, Caroline & Danny LopezThe tape was screened throughout 1996 at 14th World Wide Video Festival - Den Haag, Holland;Videonale - Bonn, Germany; New Visions - Glasgow