This search for reciprocity in the relationship between a work of art and the viewer, the freedom he grants him, the state of anticipation and uncertainty in which he puts him, all stem from his interest in the theatre of Samuel Beckett.
In Pursuit, Fears, Catastrophe: Ruskin, B. C. (1993), Stan Douglas offers a prelude to this exploration of the relationship between the image and sound by combining the projection of a black and white piece of music played on a boudoir grand player piano. This work is an artistic adaptation of history evoking the conflicts of racial identities inherent in the integration of a Japanese community in Canada during the thirties. It also highlights the desire, which Douglas shares, to revolutionize sound and visual conventions.
