Alys, Always

Frances works on the books pages of a Sunday newspaper. She’s quiet and capable, but nobody takes much notice: her face is pressed to the window, on the outside, looking in. One evening, driving back to London after visiting her infuriating parents, she comes across an upturned car crumpled on the side of the road. She waits with the injured driver, Alys Kyte, until the ambulance arrives. Later, when Alys’s famous family gets in touch, Frances finds herself for the first time ushered into the world on the other side of the window. And she begins to wonder: what would it take to become a player?

For Alys, Always, video provided an abstracted cinematic and photographic account of Aly’s life on both sides of the glass. Worlds intertwined and melted through each other across Bob Crowley’s crisp geometric gauze surfaces.