Welcome back to Art Fictions ! Jordan Baseman selects ‘Strangers on a Train’ by Patricia Highsmith. Published in 1950, the book tells of Bruno and Guy who happen meet on a train and, between whiskies and cigarettes, Bruno suggests they swap murders. I’ll kill your pesky wife if you kill my horrid father. Seems fair though somewhat macabre, not at all the sort of thing a nice young woman from Texas ought to be writing about and very much against the law. What starts badly ends even worse as the double murders lead to Bruno drowning in the sea and Guy drowning in guilt. Jordan is very much taken by the book’s single focussed account of the two men as we contrast the multitude of aspects found in any one person, which he depicts as simply as possible in his short films. Alfred Hitchcock’s adaption of the book into film makes for further pondering about social status and the American post war context.

0:00 - 0:28 the book, the film, post war America, context, no happy endings, celebrity, image, good and evil, Trump, complexity of the self, psychoanalysis, expectations of wealth and material goods

0:28 - 0:55 Jordan's films, portraiture, self portraiture, construction, artifice, film production techniques, interplay of visuals and audio

0:55 - 1:06 influences, artists, books, where to see Jordan's work  

JORDAN BASEMAN

Jordanbaseman.co.uk

mattsgallery.org

‘Blackout’

‘Gendersick’

‘Veil’

‘The Sun Always Shines on the Righteous’

‘The Dandy Doctrine’

‘The Last Walk’

BOOKS & WRITERS

‘Difficult Women’ 2017 by Roxane Gay

‘Critical Path’ 1981 by Buckminster Fuller

Czenzi Ormonde, author and screenwriter

Phyllis Nagy, screenwriter

Raymond Chandler, author and screenwriter

Roxane Gay, author, professor, editor, social commentator

Stephen King

Jonathan Franzen

SCREEN

‘Strangers on a Train’ 1951 directed by Alfred Hitchcock

‘The Wizard of Oz’ 1939 directed by Victor Fleming

‘The Hitch Hiker’ 1953 directed by Ida Lupino

‘Match Point’ 2005 directed by Woody Allen

‘The Midnight Gospel’ 2020 animation series on Netflix

ARTISTS

Robert Mapplethorpe 1946-1989

Jennifer West – film, installation, performance, zines

‘Christ’s Entry into Journalism’ by Kara Walker at MoMA

MUSIC

‘Extreme Love’ by Holly Hendron

‘Horses’ by Patti Smith

Michael Stipe