Douglas Gordon's cutting-edge work is the stuff of fantasy

The Arts Diary

Douglas Gordon's latest film will be unveiled to audiences at the Berlin Film Festival next month (AP)

Douglas Gordon's latest film, consisting solely of traditional knife-grinders in Morocco immersed in their work in different locations of the Kasbah in Tangiers, will be unveiled to audiences at the Berlin Film Festival next month.

While the work, Sharpening Fantasy, 2012, may leave some miffed, it is very much in keeping with his offbeat oeuvre: there was the video work that captured the snake charmers of Marrakech that Gordon made four years ago and before that, the film of the French footballer, Zinedine Zidane, filmed playing a game in real time.

Having seen Zidane, I can vouch for its hypnotic power and have no doubt that knife-grinders will be just as compelling under Gordon's video eye.

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