Facade and Flight of Happiness 1982

John Hilliard's 'Facade and Flight of Happiness’ is a photograph in two parts. It's a diptych, this presentation immediately introduces the idea of multiple perspectives. On the left, we see an image of a fan, held in front of a figure. It's all motion and blur, the colour palette dominated by greys and browns, shot through with the ochre and white of the fan. It reminds me of Gerhard Richter’s blurred paintings, that attempt to represent something about the act of seeing as a process. The second panel is similar, though slightly lighter. Here, the figure is more discernible, a woman in a kimono. It's like these images are trying to escape the surface of the photograph, to become something else, something less fixed. Hilliard’s work is deeply philosophical, like a conversation about the nature of representation. It seems to ask: what can photography really capture? What can any artwork really capture? It's a reminder that art is never just about the final product, it’s about the whole messy, uncertain process of getting there.