Screen Tests - Challenged to Be Bored

A series of silent film portraits consisting of several-minute unbroken shots. Personal motion pictures. Placed in front of an unmoving, unblinking camera for four minutes, these faces seek and avoid your attention. Forcing a person sit for a portrait with the same patience demanded by the earliest 19th-century photographers, is far from superficial. These films are not easy to watch. But they demand to be watched. The endurance of looking, and the tender vulnerability of allowing yourself to be looked upon. Accustomed to action and plot on the screen, we are irritated to be confronted by faces that simply stare back at us. We see the person struggling with their image — trying to protect it. You can project your image for a few seconds or perhaps a minute, but beyond that it slips away and the true self begins to show through.

Everyone is tested for four minutes.