On Looking - The Ottawa Art Gallery, 2005

On Looking is a work that elaborates on the compulsion of the need to ‘look’. My interests are in a kind of reading of the street, detailing moments/shadows and other interactions at the street-level. I am concerned with the activity of crossing of paths between the most simplistic social architectures and architectonics.

As an approach, I rely on the simple notion of the Flaneur during the making of Onlooking. The work is simultaneously the making of a video and a performative act. During the performance aspect, I have nothing definite in mind, allowing me to be drawn to intriguing sights or situations or perhaps just stroll as a passerby.

I believe that the act of seeing differs from the act of looking. The act of seeing occurs simply by the opening of eyes. The act of looking however, has more to do with an engagement of your surroundings. Somehow while walking and looking we become acutely aware of our sense of place and synonymously, the identity of the ‘other’. Much of my work has to do with this idea and how it manifests itself in various ways.

Doug Lewis - 2004

" Doug Lewis spent a week strolling through the streets of Hamilton, pushing a customized cart with a digital camera atttached underneath. Mirrors located at the front of the cart allow for perspectives as images are 'plucked' at random from the sidewalk or street. The resulting video is displayed on a monitor. In this manner, viewers' perceptions are altered as these now magnifiedimages from the horozontal streetscape of the day are projected on the vertical surface of the monitor screen. Like a miniature urban drive-in theatre they resonate in the beauty if their banalness."

Shirley Madill - Future Cities, Art Gallery of Hamilton, 2004

it's really about Nothing at All - interview with Paul Robles