Collections

End of Message

Artist: ROGER+REID · b. 2002 Artist: Reid, Kevin · b. 1974 Artist: Roger, Graeme · b. 1976

RUNNING ORDER:

00.00-00.09 Black screen
00.10-00.29 Musical score begins and film shows character in vest, pants and red/blue balaclava opening window shutters, illuminating space
00.30-01.06 Balaclava ch. puts on shirt in front of sleigh bed
01.07-01.30 Balaclava ch. In shirt, trousers and braces, exits door and walks along hallway toward camera. Knocks on door to left.
01.31-02.09 2nd balaclava ch. in same dress opens shutters in another bedroom, illuminating space, cuts to bed and puts on shirt and trousers
02.10-02.47 Shots of castle and details with balaclava ch’s. walking through and meeting mid-walk in red carpeted room
02.48-03.52 Balaclava ch’s. sit on red chairs in front of fireplace. Right hand ch. ties shoelaces leans back. Left ch. waves shoes at other ch, who then puts his shoes on and ties laces. Both characters lean back.
03.53-03.55 Black screen
03.56-04.12 Snooker room. Ch’s. play snooker [cymbals crash on break], white ball falls out the middle pocket bag.
04.13-04.35 Ch. at drinks bar, examines bottle, pours two drinks and walks to left of screen
04.36-05.14 Yellow floral sofa below painting with one ch. reading paper. Other ch. approached with drinks, sits down, they chink glasses and drink. Both read paper (the Press and Journal).
05.15-05.17 Black screen
05.18-05.21 Detail of a print of what appears to be body snatchers examining a corpse
05.22-05.29 Ch’s. at desk. Left ch. writes, while right ch. stands behind with yellow snake wrapped around him
05.30-05.34 Close up over shoulder of ch. with pen over a map with ruler, tarot card and two snakes
05.35-05.46 Brown snake slithers around gilded desk ornament
05.47-05.49 Black screen
05.50-07.47 Wide view of grand room with ch’s. at grand piano at end window. Left ch. plays piano [music begins] while right ch. feigns gestural singing. Camera pans in and around and then away again
07.48-07.50 Black screen
07.51-08.01 Close up of iron helmet mask ornament, cut to marble frieze, cut to stuffed animal head
08.02-08.29 Wide view of hall, ch’s. enter from left to end of hall, walk towards camera, cut to ch’s. stopping in front of fireplace below frieze. They both pick up brass balaclavas.
08.30-08.37 Details from bronze frieze
08.38-08.39 Black screen
08.40-10.37 Ch’s. sit at opposite ends of long dining table. Camera cuts to each and leans. Left ch. holds up egg and places on a model train that sits on a track on the table. Camera follows train as it takes 2 eggs round table to other ch. who takes them off before train heads back to left ch.. Right ch. begins to peel an egg and salt it. Both ch’s. eat through the mouth hole in their brass balaclavas.
10.38-10.40 Black screen
10.41-10.54 Ch’s. ascend stairs holding brass balaclavas, cut to detail of fresco.
10.55-10.56 Black screen
10.57-12.35 Ch’s. back in grand room. Walking forward dancing with arms outstretched, clicking fingers. Begin to spin and become more animated in their dancing, eventually jumping and bouncing around room; camera pans between and around ch’s..
12.36-12.44 Close up of ch’s faces as they spin round, background blurred by movement
12.45-12.51 Black screen
12.52-12.56 Close up of legs and shoes of ch’s hanging lifeless on bridge.
12.57-13.01 Black screen
13.02-13.29 Wide view of ch’s hanging from nooses on bridge, camera gradually moves further away from hanging ch’s, cutting between action as sun sets and black screen
13.30-13.44 Camera remains fixed on hanging ch’s with setting sun in background
13.45-13.51 Black screen to end of film End of Message is a fictional story following two anonymous characters (the artists) as they fool around Fyvie Castle in Aberdeenshire. The original idea involved a film touring battlesites but after 7/8 months Roger & Reid decided it should be more of a narrative. Battlesites have been at the core of the artists’ practice since 2004, when they began visiting Jacobite sites across Scotland and England. This journey led to the creation of the two characters featured in End of Message. They were originally conceived for the Trail of Tears film, a culmination of these visits, which premiered at Inverness Old Town Art in 2012. The cloth and brass balaclavas are a means of making the artists anonymous but also give the characters a personality. The characters are menacing, bringers of death, but also joyful and daft. Their characters are full of inherent contradictions

The brass balaclavas were made at the Scottish Sculpture Workshop and were exhibited at the 2013 RSA Annual Exhibition on the North stair landing (cat no. 1). The weight of them is a penance and adorning them is akin to a ceremony. The cloth snoods protect their heads under the brass balaclavas (in a similar way to the cloth head covers worn by knights/soldiers underneath their helmets in battle)
The film concerns themes of angst, death and icons and the narrative follows a general story of things you might do before killing yourself. However the Trail of Tears characters cannot be killed and are continually resurrected.
The film’s title arose from phone calls Roger and Reid received from a man from a local model railway club who always used to close his messages left on their answering machine with “…end of message.”

For more information on the film, see the discussion between RSA Collections Curator, Sandy Wood and Graeme Roger, stored on file in ‘Acquisitions – Scholarships and Awards’.

FROM 2013 RSA ANNUAL EXHIBITION LABEL: Graeme Roger & Kevin Reid have been working collaboratively since 2002 as Roger & Reid as well as having solo art careers. They have undertaken a number of residencies/ exhibitions in Europe, the USA and across the UK creating impromptu performances and film works.
They create theatrical based video art work that explores the territories of artistic and civic freedom, cross-cultural communication, and the lingering effects of the historical past on the perception of the present.
A reoccurring theme of these works has been historical sites and a fascination wih Scotland’s eccentrics.
The artists would like to thank National trust for Scotland/Fyvie Castle; Elgin Model Railway Club; Scottish Exotic Animal Rescue; Aberdeenshire Castle.

http://www.ssw.org.uk/rogerreid/profile/

http://www.spanglefish.com/wildbird/index.asp?pageid=119601

http://www.invernessoldtownart.co.uk/culloden-battlefield-residencies.asp

http://www.shmufm.net/