Two Things About Suffering is an installation of six short films, revolving around ideas of genre, gesture, and artifice. The same two actors appear in distinct performances, operating under different sets of directions. Filmed variously in the glaring light of the Texas desert and somber interior settings, the men enact scenes of ‘physical theater’ that shift beguilingly between slapstick, ennui, antagonism, and friendship. One of the men is the artist’s twin brother, a kind of second self. The videos imply narrative situations, yet their dramatic monologues and recurring phrases also expose the underlying mechanics and absurdities of language. The concept of genre is reflected in the structure of the installation, which comprises two ‘black box’ spaces. In one, five videos play concurrently on individual screens. In the other, the title video, Two Things About Suffering, appears as a cinematic projection – a self-contained theatrical act. In their dual simplicity of form and fluidity of meaning, Uri Aran’s films glance at genres as diverse as the existentialist drama of Samuel Beckett, the early routines of Laurel and Hardy, the spaghetti Western, and the wry conceptualism of Marcel Broodthaers.
