“Robert Marshall was instigated by the discovery of 8mm footage of the artist’s father in the possession of Canadian relatives. He had died suddenly of a heart attack alone with his son in the yard of the farm where the family lived. The tape has an elegiac mood of sadness and resignation but without any self-pity and in many ways seems to reveal death’s ultimate escape from discourse, particularly in a scene where Marshall, returning to the site of the death, cannot find the exact spot and is left with words superimposed over the image of the ground that describe the memories – “No words/jerky gesture/earthy soil..” Marshall’s refusal to take AZT and instead use alternative medicines in order to control his illness is in stark contrast to his father’s own fatal heart problems. In the end it is a piece on mortality itself where Marshall’s father serves as a precursor for his own sense of mortality – a universal theme.”
Arrows of Desire, ICA (1993).
