The video as an art medium is untainted by ‘old masters’ and is largely separated from the fantasy industry. Video is a medium that straddles the official art world, the entertainment industry and the bumbling disclosures of the amateur. It is difficult to own, to control, to co-opt. It is fundamentally subversive and as such, it is life affirming. It insists on true revelation and true beauty. When shooting video and later in the editing process, some of my influences are: the power, weight, fearlessness and personal history implicit in the sculpture of Louise Bourgeois and also Swedish film and theatre director Ingmar Bergman, of whom it was said “he explored the landscape of human emotions as no director had ever dared attempt.” Another influence is the long, uncut shots and intuitive approach of Russian filmmaker Alexander Sukorov, whose film Mother and Son depicts the relationship between a son and his dying mother. I am influenced by and have learned how to use sound, not to image, but to create mood and affect, from how Sukorov brings out the inner life of his characters with almost silent, natural sounds, creating sound from silence. I have also always been touched by the moving chiaroscuro and huge sense of humanity in Rembrandt’s self-portraits, which I also see mirrored in the purity of Eva Hesse’s sculpture. I work in a way that exploits unbridled emotions, with the aim to challenge the accepted conventions of art as an entertainment that is well behaved. From the actions of the characters [or performers] to my own use of the video camera and later in the editing process.

I aim to disrupt norms, constructing resistances to, or commenting on the tyranny of orthodoxy. I am interested in the transgressive, de-idolized female [image] – sometimes a self proclaimed hero stepping out of  history, or filling and emptying a room with furniture like a triumphant female anti-Sisyphus, or as a misbehaving twin in the cow merde close ups, always using the camera as an insisting prying tool, a decoder and an instrument of desire.

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Gunilla’s work has been widely exhibited throughout Canada and internationally.

Distribution is through www.vtape.org in Canada and www.filmform.com in Sweden.