The American artist Chris Burden is famous for being the man who shot his arm on camera; in his 1971 gallery piece Shoot, he asked a friend to shoot at his arm, intending the bullet to merely graze the skin (the friend missed; a trip to the emergency room ensued). The late Burden’s interest in sculpture mutated into a fascination with performance art that incorporated the body (often his own or that of then wife Barbara). His friends described his art as having “a sinister, science-fair vibe”: he once squashed himself into a locker for five days; for another piece he nailed himself to a Volkswagen. This inquisitive, textured documentary pairs his drug-addled youth with the most controversial era of his career but wisely avoids hagiography by refusing to make value judgments regarding his best work. Pleasing too are VHS inserts of Burden’s artistic practice in context.
