Speaking about Scenes from the Blackout, Douglas says:
'… [these] are works of speculative fiction. They’re looking at what might happen if there were a blackout in New York City sometime in the future. There were blackouts in New York City in 1977 and in 2003 and the whole social attitude of those moments were quite different: ’77 was a time of recession, the city was almost bankrupt, people were quite desperate, there was a lot of looting, a lot of violence, social upheaval; in 2003 it was just after 9/11 so there was a lot of camaraderie, people helping each other. I think the conditions right now are somewhere in between, so we see scenes of both. We see scenes of looting and rioting but also scenes of people helping each other, which are two very different conditions but cohabiting the same space.'
Image: Stan Douglas, Doppelgänger, 2019
Two screen projection
Duration varies
© Stan Douglas
Courtesy the artist, Victoria Miro, and David Zwirner