Sam Taylor-Wood’s film piece “Still Life” is simply mesmerising in so many ways. It is an astonishing short video of a fruit bowl slowly decaying, and with the musical accompany it somehow makes the viewer feel very on-edge and start to question many aspects in life. The piece could mean many things, however one meaning could be that Taylor-Wood is trying to show us the importance of life. As stated previously, in the video you watch a bowl of fruit slowly decay over time, and this could be a way of trying to show how important life is and how quick life can pass a person by, in mere minutes. As the video progresses and the fruit slowly decays you can also hear how the music which was already sad, goes further into a minor key and makes the piece even sadder, as if you’re watching a real life decay and fade away in front of your own eyes. Another perspective could be that the fruit bowl represents a sort of society, how from a functionalist perspective she could be showing how if one fruit starts to decay (if one part of society has a problem) then the decay will spread to the rest of the fruits and kill them all a lot quicker (society will fall apart), this also can be known as “the domino effect.” There could be many other perspectives and reasons why Sam Taylor Wood decided to create this piece, however these are just a few examples that seemed to stand out.
OCA Art Blog 