Running Time’s title is a reference to the videotape’s duration. In looped black and white footage, a male figure runs in a landscape towards and past the camera, never reaching his destination. The soundtrack, treated similarly to the image, loops the sound of a heartbeat. Madelon Hooykaas explains their approach in this work: ‘Both sound and image progress from the unidentifiable to the recognisable.’
Like other works produced by collaborators Stansfield/Hooykaas in this period, the central focus is on the pattern of lines that function as the basic building blocks of the black-and-white video image in its analogue form. This focus on the video’s material structure was inspired by abstract painters including Agnes Martin and Bridget Riley.