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LLEWELLYN BROWN 55 of the stage in Quad — “E supposed a danger zone”* — marked only by the abrupt swerving of the dancers. We could call such invisible squares Beckett and Nauman’s version of Malevich’s painting, of which Gérard Wajcman states: “The Black Square is the absence of an object, how to put it, embodied. It is this absence.”** Rather than commanding the scene, the spectator is immobilized and powerless: one is reduced to the status of a voyeur observing through a keyhole, rather than one situated at the center of Jeremy Bentham’s panopticon. What is offered up to the spectator’s gaze is limited to what appears within a narrow angle. Nauman thus appears as an uncontrollable being, since he escapes this space: he leaves the field of vision, moving not only across the screen but also backwards and forwards in relation to the camera. Nauman bores a hole in the gaze of the camera, as if he were taunting it: he possesses much more freedom than the spectator since, at certain moments, he crosses over the field of vision, leaving only parts of his body (torso, legs, back, head) visible. Sometimes the frame is empty, and the spectator is unable to follow him. Nauman explains: “Part of the activity takes place within the range of the camera, and part of it out of the range of the camera. You can see that the room is larger and the only contact you have is the sound of the activity, and then finally the figure comes back into the range of the camera.””” The space that remains out of reach also escapes the visual control of the spectator.°® Moreover, as Connor’ and Francois Albera® observe, all of Nauman’s movements appear to be accomplished in defiance of the laws of gravity, as he gives the impression of walking up and down a vertical wall — headfirst — asa result of the camera angle. This counterbalances his pounding feet, and the dull but luminous décor confers on the image a dream-like quality, as if it were withdrawn from worldly space and time. Nauman explains that the video was intended to be endless: “My idea at that time was that the film should have no beginning or end: one should be able to come in at any time and nothing would change." This experience of timelessness is reinforced by the unbroken sound of the machine recording. What appears on the screen thus remains totally autonomous, as if situated in another space, escaping the spectator’s control. This autonomy produces a strange fascination in the 55 Beckett: Quad in The Complete Dramatic Works, 453. Wajcman: L’Objet du siécle, 95. Wajcman undertook a similar exercise in his novel L’Interdit (Paris, Nous, 2016 [republication]) where the running titles and the constant footnotes frame the text which, as such, is missing, appearing only as the blank page. Nauman in Kraynak: Please pay attention please, 310. See Francois Albera: Nauman cinématique, in Nauman Bruce: image/texte, 1966-1996, Paris, Centre Georges-Pompidou, 1997, 53. Connor: Shifting Ground. Albera: Nauman cinématique, 53. Nauman in Kraynak: Please pay attention please, 146. + 110°
