Sue de Beer, ‘#1 This poem is me and it’s nothing but words about you I hope you like it (1)’, 2017, Daata Editions

Khary Simon interviews Sue de Beer on her 4 films for Daata Editions

Are the films intended to be presented in a specific order?

No. They are separate but connected. 

I do watch them in the order of 1, 2, 3, 4. I cut them in the order of 1, 2, 3, 4. The first two naturally connect, and the last two naturally connect. So do 1 and 4. So do 2 and 3.

Is beauty fragile and or dangerous?

Yes. Fragile. 

What about terror can be erotic or beautiful?

Everything. 

Do you cherish objects of girlhood or wish we did?

Yes.

What is the origin of titles 1 and 2?

    This poem is me 
    and it’s nothing but 
    words about you
    I hope you like it

It’s from a Dennis Cooper poem – one that he contributed to my first catalogue. I think it’s beautiful. Shifts around the watcher and the watched.

Khary Simon is a creative director and publisher based in New York.

About Sue de Beer

Exploring ideas of imagined memories and the phenomenon of light, Sue de Beer creates installations comprising sculpture, video, and light projections. As viewers move through her spaces, they block the projected light, casting shadows and eclipsing the objects. In a 2011 installation, de Beer projected a film that had been edited to produce “persistence of vision”—an optical phenomenon in which the perceived image is thought to remain on the retina for a fraction of a second. De Beer uses repeated patterns, a saturated palette, and cinematic devices and lighting to construct her haunting, dreamlike narratives that evoke familiar-yet-intangible associations. To quote a character from her 2002 film Hans & Grete, “Sometimes, you remember places you have never been, or people you have never met.”

American, b. 1973, based in New York, New York