Easy Does It
The hero of Le Chevallier's video lives in the present day but shares the do-nothing ethos of Ivan Goncharov's 19th-century aristocrat. Russia's laziest literary figure, Ilya Oblomov, has been celebrated with everything from restaurants to a designer armchair bearing his name. Now the slothful aristocrat has inspired a French artist to create an interactive video where the player tries to spur the sleeping hero into action.
When Ivan Goncharov published his novel Oblomov in 1859, some critics saw the main character as symbolizing all that was wrong with the ruling classes. Lounging around in a dressing gown, Oblomov perpetually puts off doing anything, despite the pleas of his friends. Yet the good-natured hero has since become a cult figure, admired for his serene, apolitical approach to life.
Last month, video artist Martin
Le Chevallier traveled to Goncharov's hometown of Ulyanovsk to present Oblomov,
an interactive film based on the novel. In his version, the hero is surrounded
by the paraphernalia of modern life – a laptop, a telephone, a pack of
cigarettes – but shares the original character's reluctance to get out
of bed.
During a recent visit to Moscow, Le Chevallier played the five-minute video
loop on his laptop. For a few seconds, Oblomov, played by fellow artist Olivier
Bardin, is shown sleeping peacefully. Then the image comes to a standstill.
At this point the viewer can intervene by clicking the mouse – or pressing
a button, if at a public screening – to make the hero move on. He can
get up, have a smoke, drink wine or call someone on the phone.
"The idea is that you are like Oblomov's friends," Le Chevallier said, referring to the book's active characters, Stolz and Olga, who try to talk the hero into moving to a new apartment, traveling and getting married. Just as in the novel, though, the player can only persuade the hero to take short-term action, since the video loop always returns him to his original sleeping position.
The game is a "free interpretation"
of Goncharov's novel rather than an adaptation, the artist said. The French
Oblomov lives in a bare white room, unlike the original hero's dusty, bug-infested
apartment. And his crisp blue shirt stands in contrast to the soiled Oriental
dressing gown usually shown in the novel's illustrations.
A graphic designer by training, Le Chevallier read Goncharov's novel in 1999
and saw parallels with another interactive project he was working on at the
time: Wager 1.0, a game he calls an "existence simulator".
Set in the world of work, the game requires the player to carry out pointless
tasks framed in management-speak.
In Oblomov, the player has the option of standing back and being "contemplative,
like in front of a painting", the artist said. The video loop never completely
stops, but moves slightly back and forth, creating an effect he calls "still
life." By clicking the mouse, on the other hand, the player gets a short
burst of action and entertainment, but ultimately nothing changes.
Oblomov is a sympathetic character, Le Chevallier believes, while the hero's friends are "people who do too much." But the artist doesn't totally identify with Oblomov. "I'm not lazy enough," he said.
Le Chevallier first showed the video in Turin, Italy, in 2001, but last month's screening in Ulyanovsk marked its first showing in Russia. The artist received funding for his trip to Russia from the French Foreign Ministry after a German scholar put him in contact with the Ivan Goncharov House Museum.
Following the video's presentation, the museum will hold an exhibition of Le Chevallier's work this autumn, the artist said. An exhibition is also tentatively scheduled in Nizhny Novgorod. As yet, though, there are no plans to show the film in Moscow.
Anna Malpas in «The Moscow Times», Friday, July 8, 2005. Page 102..