An Radharc ón Fhuinneog Chúil. The View from the Backseat.

“I was still a shadow then. Scáth na scáthanna. I had no real shape or form. Those came later. It took months before I could hold anything for longer than an instant. This came through concentration, by watching every aspect of a form. Every detail….”

Moving between two languages, an radharc ón fhuinneog chúil. the view from the backseat, is narrated by a watcher, a parasitic double, who waits in the shadows. This work began as a ‘conversation’ with an image, that of the back of a car, from which came the scáth na scáthanna.

Is físeán le guthú é an saothar seo, an radharc ón fhuinneog chúil. the view from the backseat, ag bogadh idir dhá theanga. Is breathnóir agus cineál leathcheann seadánach é an scéalaí a fhanann sna scáthanna. Thosaigh an saothar seo mar ‘chomhrá’ le híomhá ó chúl an ghluaisteáin, óna dtáinig a shadow of shadows.

“You haven’t wished me happy birthday yet. It’s ok. I’m not angry with you, no one has, not even the child. This I have determined: no one really has the foggiest, the slightest, merest hint of a clue that it is today. Birthday’s isn’t something I bothered with at first, it is that way when you do not sleep. But the more I watched, the more I learned, the more I became aware of the waiting. And so I began to count, to divide, subdivide. There is, after all, an awful lot of waiting.

Then, some days, event days, pierce the great big moth addled drudge of it all. Those days, fold the likes of you and the likes of me, so close, and pinch. Pressing through. Invigorating. I am jumping ahead. I’ll get back to the birthday.

Do you remember being born? Probably you do not, for it is not in your nature, sin mar a bhíonn. I do, or at least, I remember the first sight. It was the view from the backseat. Much like where we are now. It, the first sight, came through the back window. It was a mouth, the mouth. At the time I did not have your words for it, I am translating now with what pieces I have assembled. This was a grey day, the inside of the car was grey the outside of the car was grey, the rain traced grey lines across the window. 

Then came the mouth. It lashed against the glass, as things always lash against windows, a gap surrounded by a smearing mop of brown-black fur against the grey. It, the mouth, was a not as in n.o.t, as in that rare kind of tear in this material of things, a swallowing of sense and light. Then it, the mouth, was sudden pink tongue lolling, then it, the mouth was teeth dirty white flicking the rage furious oh the sound, sudden rising bark bark bark frustrated punctuation, frantic rolling bark-bark-bark. Béal an Mhadaidh, a total all, this the first sight.

Then I saw the watching. The second sight. The child watching…”

Go raibh maith agaibh: le Liam Ó Bradaigh as a chuidiú, agus Courtney Braniff, Niall Ó Siadhail agus Aoife Nig Loingsigh as a gcuidiú fosta.

Thanks also to the team at CCA Derry/Londonderry

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An initial version of this work was produced as part of figments.art project.
“Tá saothar beag agam sa tionscadal seo. Tá sé as Béarla den chuid is mó ach tá cúpla focal Gaeilge ann. Is cineal comhra é idir fuaim, nó téacs, agus íomhá (tá athscríbhinn ann fosta).
As part of a ‘gathering of exchanges with pictures’, I contributed a short fiction in English and some Irish, with an accompanying image of the open back of a car. There is audio file & image on each artist’s page and you can scroll down for a transcript.”

figments is conceived by Alice-Anne Psaltis with design by Arturo Guzmán Pérez