Douglas Gordon: I Had Nowhere to Go

In his film for Documenta 14, Scottish video artist Douglas Gordon (born 1966) presents a portrait of Jonas Mekas’ acclaimed autobiography I Had Nowhere to Go, mixing stills with footage of Mekas reading. The book relays how Mekas fled his home in Lithuania to escape the Nazis, ending up in a camp for displaced persons before managing to emigrate to America, where he commenced his career in underground film, establishing the legendary Anthology Film Archives in New York. Gordon’s artist’s book accompanies his film. Neither is a straight retelling of Mekas’ classic account of dislocation; rather, they are Gordon’s artistic reactions to his book and its narrative style. The book merges film stills with text excerpts from Mekas’ memoir.