There’s a video from 1972 in this Camden Arts survey of Montana-born artist David Askevold (1940-2008), in which the artist’s face is shown upside down. The slightly fuzzy quality of the video gives Askevold’s eyes a distinctly sinister appearance as he stares at the camera, trying not to blink. The soundtrack is Ray Charles’s ‘It’s No Use Crying’. It reminded me of Bas Jan Ader’s video ‘I’m Too Sad to Tell You’(1971-2), a work by another early video artist whom, in 2006, Camden Arts Centre also surveyed. But whereas Askevold is being still and steely, Ader showed himself as emotional and openly weeping. Ader’s exhibition brought a new generation of fans to his poetic mix of heroic failure and slapstick. This exhibition ought to do the same for Askevold, but Askevold seems a far more difficult artist to get a handle on.
There’s an occult interest in nature and natural elements evident in works such as the video ‘Nova Scotia Fires’, 1969, in which trails of flaming oil burn against the backdrop of crashing waves. In another film, snakes writhe around among ball bearings attached to home-made string instruments, in an experiment to get them to play Johannes Kepler’s ‘Music of the Spheres’. Kepler was a seventeenth-century mathematician who related musical harmony to the motion of the planets. Music also features in the set-up and documentation for a performance to invoke the ghost of Hank Williams. There’s also a touch of Kenneth Anger’s freewheeling films to be found in Askevold’s aesthetic.
As an exhibition these works seem more like fragments of something that is never quite explained. Even writings about Askevold focus more on his role as an educator than his art – his conceptual teachings and workshops influenced students including Tony Oursler and Mike Kelly, both of whom collaborated on works in this exhibition. There’s another connection with Bas Jan Ader here as Askevold replaced Ader at the University of California after the Dutchman disappeared at sea in 1975. Ader may have had a mysterious death (his body was never found), but there’s something that still feels equally elusive about Askevold’s life and work.