John Smith
The Girl Chewing Gum, 1976
12mins
Black & White 16mm

The more I see of older art works, the more I worry that very few things are truly new. The latest incident? When I saw John Smith's Girl Chewing Gum (1976) in Artists Space's In the Poem About Love You Don't Write The Word Love. One watches a street scene and listens to a voice appearing to direct the action on the screen. It doesn't hurt that he sounds a bit like a Monty Python narrator.

I had never heard of this piece when I first saw Noah Klersfeld's work Pay Roll. Todd Gibson describes it here. Maybe it doesn't really matter, since I knew nothing of John Smith's work, and probably Todd and Mr. Klersfeld didn't either.

luxonline has a page describing the work and a short video excerpt.

Related: 2003 interview with John Smith in Millenium Film Journal.

[image above from luxonline]