Private View:
Thursday 1 February, 5pm-8pm
London Gallery West is pleased to exhibit a touring programme of 1980’s film and video works by the post-punk and scratch video movement, curated by William Fowler of the BFI for LUX, London. This is a rare chance to see the early works of major artists such as Cerith Wyn Evans, Grayson Perry, Isaac Julien as well as filmmakers who successfully moved onto the commercial world of pop promos and commercial cinema such as Steven Chivers, Sophie Muller and John Maybury. Produced mainly in the early 1980’s during a period of great social and political change these radical works are particularly relevant today at a time when tectonic shifts are also taking place in media, arts and society.
‘In the early 1980s, clubbers, art students, new romantics and members of the post-punk scene used inexpensive, domestic technology to find new modes of expression and subvert the mainstream media. Independent VHS tapes were released, stridently bypassing censorship, and Super 8 film was embraced as a cheap yet distinctly lyrical and direct new medium. The DIY approach of punk was powerfully reborn.
The period also saw new perspectives and voices emerge. More female, gay and black filmmakers pushed themselves forward and often they were friends; squatting flats, clubbing and developing new styles and techniques together. When not working with Derek Jarman, John Maybury and Cerith Wyn Evans led the charge amongst the Super 8 crowd, casting friends such as Leigh Bowery and Siouxsie Sioux in fragmented, dreamlike scenarios. Isaac Julien and Grayson Perry also made films as did major pop video director Sophie Muller in her early days. ‘Scratch video’ artists meanwhile cut-up pre- existing material to create startling new juxtapositions and reveal hidden meanings, and had an extraordinary impact.
These programmes focus on work from the early 80s that explored the blurred lines between media images and identity, creating new dialogues between the self and the world. It was an uncertain, politically contentious time; a time in which – very much like today with the internet – technology appeared to ease life, make things more exciting yet also create gaps between people. Artists considered what images and technology could mean and be in their fullest sense.
The majority of the Super 8 and 16mm films due to screen in these programmes have been out of circulation for thirty years. Titles have been tracked down and digitally scanned at 2K. The project forms part of the BFI National Archive’s ongoing work to restore significant yet marginalised areas of historical British experimental film. It is the premier of a project that will later tour internationally through the artist moving image agency LUX. Don’t miss seeing these rediscovered, vibrant and transgressive works.’