Art Film Now

Jacob Charles Wilson remains unfazed by two German artists’ threats

Two German artists have successfully trolled the old media with a performance entitled Die Guillotine (the guillotine). Iman Rezai and Rouven Materne have built a guillotine and started an online vote to determine whether a sheep should live or die. This is no simple internet troll though, but an artwork that looks at the video on the Internet, ethics, and democracy.

Killing animals is nothing new, and killing animals for mass entertainment isn’t either. Since the invention of the moving image death has captivated audiences. At the dawn of cinema Thomas Edison made a short film entitled Electrocuting an Elephant, ostensibly to demonstrate the danger of economic rival Tesla’s AC electricity, but clearly also as a record of death on the new moving medium.

Today, with the Internet and increasingly more footage, people are still fascinated by both animals and death. Within moments you can go from watching puggles (baby platypuses), to seeing a hostages head being cut off, from a faux-vintage kitten to protesters being gassed and shot.

The key part of Die Guillotine though is not the killing (which in all likelyhood would never be carried out), but the vote. The killing of the sheep is a democratic choice, and surely despite turnout or voter intention the outcome should be honoured. The banal choice of whether a single sheep lives or dies has been given the significance of national independence or electoral reform. This is what forces liberals to question their unequivocal support of democracy.

This performance is concerned with festishisation of polls, the reduction of all political thought to a simple binary choice, the mirage of involvement and action that phone-in votes and internet petitions give. It also looks at the consequences of votes, the loss of an ethical or moral code in the face of the will of ‘the people’ - read, the electorate / lobbyists. The artists have described their role as that of, “the executioner, sacrificing their own desires and ethics for the good of the majority”.

The questioning of democracy is particularly pertinent given the Arab Spring, the IMF in Greece and Europe, and the recent re-election of Boris Johnson to London Mayor. There was disparagement amongst London liberals who complained that some people only voted for Boris ‘for a laugh’ rather than based on rational thought. Boris has previously called for a quorum on strike ballots of 50%, however the turnout for the mayoral election a few days ago was only 38%.

The absurdity of the responses from the media and commenters provides amusement, but also highlights the pointlessness of saving a single ‘innocent’ sheep. Animals are killed every single day, it is a fact of life that to eat meat an animal has to die, and that even if we were not to eat meat, animals would still die. Animal welfare should therefore be focussed on the life of the animal, not on its final few seconds.

The desperation of people to save the sheep reveals their hypocrisy when faced with suffering humans. Not just condemned people in the US, China, or Saudi Arabia, but the oppressed in every society. The economic crisis has brought to bear the facts of capitalism onto the relative few ‘doing well’ out of the whole thing: Violence and death are required and endemic in capitalism. When human beings are being killed by governments and corporations - in violation to the law they claim to uphold - purely to ensure the survival of a decaying and inherently unequal economic system, why should anyone care for a single sheep?

Jacob Charles Wilson reviews the disappointing retrospective

‘Damien Hirst is weird’

This is the reaction fellow contributor Laura gave when I said I was visiting the Damien Hirst retrospective at the Tate Modern. Months ago when I initially heard about the exhibition I was unsure whether to bother seeing it. Damien Hirst is far from my favourite artist, and his key works are so well known and reproduced that I seriously doubted whether seeing them IRL would allow me to consider them differently. It was only when a few friends invited me to a late viewing that I thought I ought to go and see it.

Viewing the exhibition at 9pm on a Sunday night we experienced it in a totally different way to most people. A friend who had seen it earlier had described queues stretching into the Turbine Hall, and said that actually viewing the artworks was nearly impossible. For us there were no crowds, the few people who were there clearly had a significant interest in the arts and I imagine they genuinely appreciated Hirst’s work. My friend George was one of these enthusiastic viewers, and he recognised I was less so. I have various problems with Hirst, which this exhibition only confirmed.

Hirst has always seen himself as a conceptual artist, however much of his work is marked by a sheer lack of concept. The low level of thought which has gone into its creation means the viewer will very rarely be challenged or forced to think critically. Like Thomas Kinkade’s work, Hirst’s is a very comforting art, easy to hate and easy to like. It is this ease of viewing that George actually finds appealing, for me, art which fails to make us think is the worst form of kitsch.

Hirst repeatedly works on the same weak concepts. The retrospective lacked variety, it felt like a single exhibition, rather than an overview of a lifetimes work. In repeatedly constructing pharmacy shelves, Hirst isn’t increasing the concept, merely his market value. The endless dot paintings are the archetypal Hirst work, mass produced and articulating one thought. Comparisons could be made with Mondrian, who likewise turned out dozens of similar abstract works, however seven decades have passed since Mondrian, and Hirst only appears to have just caught up. Perhaps though we should consider Hirst in context, the vapid vacuity of his work more suited to those halcyon days where the end of history was truth, not ideology.

The greatest problem I have with Hirst is what I see as an almost complete lack of irony. Hirst imagines himself a punk-artist or troll, operating some sort of accelerationist programme within the artworld. Instead, all I see is a sincere pandering to the ruling class and its various structures, institutions, and the state. Towards the end of the exhibition there is a room where Hirst has ‘ironically’ created new bejewelled versions of his classics. However I felt sincerity hadn’t been entirely eclipsed.

The few works I did enjoy were the ones involving living / dying animals - A Thousand Years (1990) and In and Out of Love (1991) - perhaps because they can’t be accurately replicated in images or videos. Even then though I felt that these works would be more suited to a Futurist exhibition in 1912 than 2012.

Ultimately it is the fame of Hirst supports and destroys him. The repetition of his works across all media is what has made him famous and justifies the obscene prices for his works, yet at the same time it devalues the art object. When I stood in front of the dead shark, it wasn’t the dead shark, but a dead shark, merely one of the hundreds of others I’ve seen in my life. I was glad that I went to the exhibition, precisely because it only confirmed my belief in the continual destruction of the artistic aura.

Jacob Charles Wilson got drunk and went to the cinema.

Investigate all culture. It was this I held in mind last week as I finished my last pint and walked to the Prince Charles Cinema to watch a screening of The Room.

The Room (2003) is widely regarded as the best worst film ever made, a vanity project for writer, lead actor, director, and executive producer Tommy Wiseau. The film is riddled with narrative and technical errors to the extent that The Room is marked out from other merely bad movies: Disjointed incoherent dialogue intersperses numerous anguish inducing sex scenes, all of which was shot simultaneously in both 35mm and HD, due to Wiseau’s confusion over the two formats; plotlines appear and dissolve, characters are introduced either explicitly or without mention, and there are frequent gratuitous scenes of characters throwing an American football.

The Prince Charles Cinema does regular screenings for its cult following, which are genuinely unique cinema experiences diametrically opposed to the more usual reserved and strictly silent cinema. The only good comparison is the Rocky Horror Picture Show, however unlike the fans of that film, the following of The Room is purely ironic. When you go to see Wiseau’s masterpiece at the cinema, you’re not watching the film, but actually going for the audience participation.

The audience at each screening is heavily drunk, though this is actually encouraged by the cinema, which serves ‘Scotchka’ - a mix of vodka and scotch drank by the characters of The Room - at the cinema bar. Being sober throughout the night would be a serious mistake, losing your inhibitions is required as no attempt is actually made by anyone to watch the film. As with any cult following, The Room is known inside out and various memes have grown. The noise of the inebriated audience yelling at the onscreen dialogue or variously insulting the characters and criticising the cinematography means the the soundtrack is impossible to decypher.

The only way to describe the event is Dionysian. It’s a collective ritual enjoyment in which alcohol fuels the deliberate breaking of cinema norms. It certainly makes for a different night out, and a genuinely enjoyable cinema experience. I will definitely be going to the next showing.

The next screening of The Room at the Prince Charles Cinema is on the 1st of June.

Jacob Charles Wilson responds to J.J. Charlesworth.

In the March 2012 ArtReview J.J. Charlesworth writes a short piece on the problems facing political art and artists in the current climate. This post expands on the shorter one I wrote the other day.

Charlesworth believes artists are making some of the most political work in decades, yet at the same time many appear to believe that the political content is of no consequence, and seem surprised when their work is censored. Artists are now finding that galleries are not the spaces for critical works, as the institutions themselves blunt the effectiveness of their message. All over Europe radical galleries have publicly funded budgets cut by governments, or corporate sponsors are questioning their support of explicitly anti-capitalist art. Will the Tate produce anything genuinely radical whilst supported by BP? - or any other company for that matter.

Charlesworth further believes that the radicalism we are seeing is merely a mirage. He states the West isn’t seeing the groundswell of organisation and mobilisation that would be expected of a crisis of such intensity. He sees art as essentially a sublimation of peoples’ revolutiuonary ideas; though art appears to become more radical, it is impotent as no action is taking place.

Essentially this is a criticism of the institution. The suggestion being that artists have to work outside the gallery or academy if they want to produce genuinely radical art. Similar arguments have been made for general political activism; whether it is desirable, or even possible, to work outside of institutions and social relations. Liberals have been criticised by the left for attempting political reform via the parliamentary system, the argument being that reform is impossible when the parameters of debate deliberately restrict radicalism. The Occupy movement has come under criticism from those on the right as well as left for essentially working within capitalism: Louise Mensch’s notable jibe at the protesters was that they couldn’t complain if they benefited from the results of capitalism, in their case, a cup of coffee. The response is that existing outside of capitalism is impossible, as capitalism is a set of social relations, not a ‘thing’ one can opt in and out of.

Unlike capitalism, it is genuinely possible to escape the gallery system. Working outside the institution in order to produce radical art has a long tradition in art history: The Impressionists, arguably the first modern art movement, was created by a disparate group of rebels who organised an art group based on the cooperative principles of a bakers’ union. They understood that the academies and the Salon would not tolerate the radical art they wanted to create. By working en plein air, literally and figuratively, outside of the academies they produced some of the most enduring works of the 19th and 20th centuries.

The reason Charlesworth fails to recognise a radical resistance is precisely because it is not working within the institutions. Instead of the the massed and easily identifiable movements of workers that the modernist 20th century saw, we are seeing smaller networks of radicalised people, relating to the precarious worker of post-Fordism. Forming and deforming on an ad hoc basis, but remaining in contact via the web and IRL; this anarchist or autonomist approach contrasts with the ‘traditional’ hierarchical and rigidly structured Leninist or Trotskyist party of the left. This decentralised form of organisation is not well recognised by the media, consider how the anti-workfare protests, largely organised by Boycott Workfare, were linked by the BBC and others to the SWP’s Right to Work front. With a lack of coverage (which should be expected as they are institutional media), it results that these new forms of political organisation are difficult to recognise.

We see a similar organisational form appearing in the Arts. The most radical contemporary work is being created by groups working outside the institution, groups such as Auto Italia, the DSG, and to a less political but more practical sense The Photocopy Club. Formal groups need not even be formed, individual artists, linked by the Internet are collaborating together on an ad hoc basis.

What differentiates these groups and links from institutions? What I am suggesting is not that organisation itself is wrong, but that the organisational form of the institution is wrong. The institution demands an orthodoxy in order to sustain its form, and orthodoxy inevitably results in an inevitably reactionary artform. It is only through autonomous networks that art can be made truly radical. Artists looking to create emancipatory art should look outside the gallery and in the plein air.

Jacob Charles Wilson explains why even fire-bombing a prison truck can now be considered ‘Art’.

‘A gift to all political prisoners of Russia.’ - Voina

Picasso is often quoted as saying ‘Art is not made to decorate rooms. It is an offensive weapon in the defense against the enemy.’ The Russian art group Voina (meaning War) appear to have reversed this aphorism, turning actions against the enemy into art.

Throughout the twentieth century artists wishing to critique the state, capitalism, and other injustices usually limited themselves to physically harmless actions; satire and parody, graffiti and defacement. Actions which though sometimes disruptive, restrain themselves within the acceptable limits of art.

Voina have created similarly restrained works: Though provocative and scandalous, their In Memory of the Decemberists (2008) can be seen as a standard piece of performance art; willing participants acting in a public place. However in their more radical actions Voina ignore conventional aesthetics and the liberal disdain for interventionist direct action. In doing so they present themselves as the inheritors of the ‘anti-art’ radicalism of avant-garde movements such as the Futurists and Dadaists.

The question must be asked, what exactly makes fire-bombing a prison truck, upturning police cars (with cops inside), or throwing cats at McDonald’s workers ‘Art’. What justifications exist for what war-mongering parliamentarians so quickly condemn as wanton-vandalism.

Though Voina’s actions result in no art objects as such (if one discounts smouldering axles), they do document their actions for posterity and proliferation. It could be said that the act of filming differentiates them from any other attack. That the process of capturing and dispersing knowledge of the ephemeral event turns it into art, in a similar way as to how Ai Weiwei’s Dropping a Han Dynasty Urn (1995) isn’t just an act of destruction.

Seeing the Voina videos as documented expressions of anger would place them squarely within the realm of art, in the same way that Jackson Pollock’s paintings are records of his emotions. The fire-bombing of a truck becomes little different to the hurling of paint across a canvas, both are acts of catharsis, expressed and recorded in the most appropriate manner. However, many violent acts of expression are caught on camera and not accorded the status of ‘art’. Logically there must be some formal quality that differentiates Voina’s videos from footage of riots or a drunken fights.

A study of Voina’s videos reveals the careful stage management and editing that goes into their production. There is a clear narrative to each; preparation, the action, and then an ending. This three part structure is seen in Palace Coup (2010): The video begins with Voina member Natalia Sokol’s young child Kaspar accidentally kicking a football under a police car, in order to retrieve the ball the members of Voina flip the car over, then escape into the night. The written descriptions of actions similarly follow a narrative structure, the recalling of the fire-bombing act (in Russian), being particularly poetic.

The cinematography of Voina’s films can be compared to existing lo-fi video art. Indeed it may be said that in the manner of their editing, the use of handheld cameras, and the lack of special effects, Voina’s videos represent ultimate examples of Dogme 95 films.

To analyse the works purely on a formal basis is however to alienate them from their context; this artwork isn’t just a piece of cinema, but an actual prison van being burnt down. What is it that makes the act of arson an artwork? It could be said that the artistic status of the video derives solely from the fact that Voina claims it to be art. In other words, the only qualifier for artistic status is for an authoritative member of the ‘artworld’ to intentionally confer the status of art. Here we have a more Marxist approach as it looks to explain cultural production in terms of class and ideology.

This justification is however debatable as the status of Voina as an art group is not fully accepted by the established artworld, and Voina themselves explicitly reject association with galleries or private individuals. The question of whether burning a van is art remains.

As we have seen above, the problem of justifying Voina actions as art can be attempted through turning to classic theories of art; specifically those of expression, form, and of the institution. However the main liberal objection to these acts focuses not on questions of aesthetics but a question of ‘violence’. To them, an upturned car or burnt van may well constitute art as much as a dead shark, but where the participant is not willing then it is not art, merely violence or vandalism.

How violent are Voina’s actions? If one subscribes to Slavoj Zizek’s views, as espoused in his 2008 book Violence, the answer should of course be ‘not very’. Compared to the systemic violence required on an everyday basis to keep the economy and society functioning then flipping a car is a drop in the ocean. Furthermore, this minor act of vandalism could be justified if it draws attention to the greater systemic violence of the state or other oppressive powers. Indeed this is the very justification liberals use in their defence of Banksy’s illegal graffiti, however they refuse to extend their own logic to Voina.

Voina are not trying to conform to the existing art models, they are instead deliberately expanding the notion of what constitutes art, introducing new forms and languages (based on an alternative reading of ‘violence’) in order to critique the increasingly irrational world. This is what Voina member Oleg Vorotnikov expressed when he said,

“By our actions we depict the portrait of this crazy world. And make the world see it and get horrified.”

In flipping a car or burning a van Voina are recreating, on the micro-scale, the same systemic violence that occurs in everyday life in order to sustain the economy. In an act similar that of propaganda of the deed, Voina expose the systemic and irrational violence of State when they are unlawfully arrested. Their experience offers a valuable lesson to liberal Russians convinced that the state will act rationally and reform can come from within the parliamentary system.

This new language of art used by Voina reflects the idea of the “End of Art” which Arthur Danto has put forward since the 1960s: Art, being freed from its requirements for representation, may now consist of anything - even vandalism or violence.

“There is no special way works of art have to be. And that is the present and, I should say, the final moment in the master narrative. It is the end of the story.”

To liberals and other reactionaries the acceptance of violence as art is anathema, but they fail to realise that this new art is a logical extension of the liberalisation of the Arts, and merely a reflection of the systemic violence, alienation, and material goods produced by capitalism. Whilst in occupied Paris, a German Officer questioned Picasso on why he had made Guernica such a ‘monstrous chaos’, Picasso replied, ‘You made it.’

Further Reading

Laura Marie Scott explains why the short-lived movement remains influencial today.

The German Expressionist movement of film-making was just one part of a general artistic tendency pervading all aspects of culture in the early 20th century, including painting, literature and theatre. A specific definition of the film style is difficult to agree upon, but it can generally be stated that the movement was most prevalent in Germany throughout the 1920s and into the early ’30s (although Willet - quoted by Robinson, 1997 - claims that the movement lasted roughly from 1910-1922: a statement that many critics would contend with since it excludes films, like Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927) and M (1931), which are widely discussed as part of an Expressionist context).

Expressionist film-makers chose to emphasise the emotions of their characters, which were shown through exaggerated performances, dramatic make-up and costume, and through the symbolism of the locations. The characters’ inner turmoil and themes of confusion, betrayal and fragility were often represented in the films’ settings through the use of geometric shapes, obtuse angles and a heightened level of contrast between light and dark. Expressionist films may also reflect negative associations of authority (as part of a general feeling of bitterness towards the German government after the First World War), and a fearful depiction of industrialisation at a time when urban areas were expanding rapidly.

Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) provides what is probably the clearest example of the movement, using its elaborately painted sets to reflect the insanity of the characters. Horizontal and vertical lines are replaced with sharp, jagged angles and bizarrely shaped spaces. Shadows are painted directly on to the set, heightening the level of contrast. The characters are given a dramatic appearance, particularly the character of Cesare who is displayed with dark lips and black make-up around his eyes. For much of the film, the primary authority figure (Dr. Caligari) is portrayed as insane and a criminal (although this negative portrayal of authority is undermined completely by the film’s twist ending). It is evident that Caligari meets much of the criteria for a German Expressionist film.

Still from ‘The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari’ - note the way that the buildings and objects all appear to be leaning in on the characters, creating a feeling of claustrophobia.

Although German Expressionism is widely regarded as a short-lived movement, restricted to a narrow time period and geographical location, it is possible to see the influence of this movement on many more contemporary films. The rise of the Nazi party in Germany caused many German directors and actors to move either to America or elsewhere in Europe. This included such names as the aforementioned Fritz Lang who continued his successful film-making career over in Hollywood. This emigration of German talent into Hollywood is attributed as one of the main factors in the influence of German Expressionism being recognisable in films outside of the movement.

The term ‘film noir’ generally refers to a particular style of crime film prevalent mostly in Hollywood during the 1940s and ’50s. This movement gained much of its stylistic influence from German Expressionist cinema. Films like Double Indemnity (1944), The Third Man (1949) and Sunset Blvd (1950) use high contrast lighting, shadows and silhouettes, and canted camera angles. For The Third Man, director Carol Reed constantly kept the camera off-kilter, so that lines which ordinarily would be horizontal or vertical were instead at an angle, fracturing the space. This technique was used to such an extent that it apparently prompted Reed’s friend and fellow director William Wyler to send him a spirit level, which he jokingly advised Reed to attach to his camera for future productions (according to White, 2003). However, the look of film noir did differ from Expressionism in some ways. Noir narratives tended to focus on the ‘gritty underworld’ of urban locations, therefore these films were more likely to use real locations rather than studio sets. Schrader (2009) explains how the influence of German Expressionism was brought to realistic locations, creating “an uneasy, exhilarating combination of realism and expressionism.”

By extension of the apparent influence of Expressionist techniques on noir films, we can also see some Expressionist elements in more modern films such as Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner (1982). Blade Runner is often described as a science fiction/neo-noir hybrid. The term neo-noir refers to modern films that contain many similar elements to classic noir films, but in an updated context. Ridley Scott incorporated Expressionist lighting techniques into his film, with a strong use of contrast and silhouetting. Blade Runner alsodeals with similar futuristic, dystopian themes as Lang’s film Metropolis and is described by some as an updated version of the same film.

Alfred Hitchcock is another director apparently inspired by Expressionist techniques. Early in his career he had worked on a film entitled The Blackguard (1925), which is where he gained experience working with German Expressionist directors. Duncan (2011) states that, “Hitchcock, who loved the work of Fritz Lang, Ernst Lubitsch and others, was in seventh heaven watching and talking with F.W Murnau whilst he was making his masterpiece Der Letzte Mann (The Last Laugh, 1924).” A heavy use of key light and contrast is evident in such Hitchcock films as Psycho (1960), such as in the famous shower-murder scene where the killer is shown to us only in silhouette. It could be said that the shadowy mise-en-scene of the film helps to reflect the inner insanity of the character of Norman Bates.

Tim Burton is perhaps the most obvious example of a contemporary director who repeatedly shows the influence of Expressionism in his work. One key example of this is the film Edward Scissorhands (1990), where the title character bears a recognisable resemblance to Cesare in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. The gothic house where Edward is found also reflects Expressionist style, and this bleak location of his upbringing seems to represent his emotional difficulties. Burton juxtaposes this dark, gothic style with the candy-coloured suburban location of the rest of the film, creating a humorous effect. Burton’s Batman films - Batman (1989) and Batman Returns (1992) - emphasise the location in a similar way to Expressionist films, with a clear gothic influence cast over the appearance of Gotham City. The character of The Penguin in Batman Begins also bears a striking resemblance to Dr. Caligari. MacIntyre goes into more detail on the Expressionist influence on Batman Begins in his article, which I highly recommend.

The influence of German Expressionism clearly lives on, despite the fact that it is regarded as a brief moment in cinematic history. Its influence on directors such as Alfred Hitchcock is extremely important, as his films went on to inspire countless more film-makers. Over time, the direct influence of the movement may have been forgotten; the techniques used by directors then have repeatedly been passed down until we no longer stop to think about where they originally came from. The use of a location to represent emotions and characters is a frequent trope in many modern films, showing that some of these techniques are now so commonplace that we fail to attribute the origins of them to Expressionism.

Further Reading and References:

• Duncan, P. (2011) Alfred Hitchcock. Taschen
• Robinson, D. (1997) Das Cabinet Des Dr. Caligari. British Film Institute
• Schrader, P. (2009) ‘Notes on Film Noir’ In Braudy, L. And Cohen, M (eds) Film Theory and Criticism. Oxford University Press
• White, R. (2003) The Third Man. British Film Institute
• David Boles discusses the influence of Expressionism on Lady Gaga’s Alejandro video
• John MacIntyre on Expressionism in Batman Returns
• Frank Streicher’s defines German Expressionism

Jacob Charles Wilson discovers the modern world in Euan Macdonald’s works at the Hayward Gallery.

The realisation that one lives in a modern world comes about in many ways. For many the process has not begun, they move through life, feeling what Marshall Berman describes as the ‘terror of disorientation and disintegration, of life falling apart’, but unaware of its significance. If you want to see what modernity is, then few works express it better than the three pieces that comprise Euan Macdonald’s micro exhibition at the Hayward Gallery. The show is beautiful in its simplicity, and prompted a more intense contemplation on modernity than many books or articles I have recently read.

Macdonald’s work is very much concerned with the auditory experience, the exhibition space designed so that the cacophony of his short film 9000 Pieces (2010) is experienced long before you reach it. The work is a futurist-like nightmare, a looped five minute projection of a machine designed to hit the keys of a piano in order to push it to its breaking limit, in what is clinically termed ‘a repetition and responsiveness test’. The new piano, a piece of venerated craftsmanship, is thrown into a battle of machines, it is pushed to its limits, broken if needs be, by an automaton that plays not in order to create beautiful music, but to deliberately wreck the weak to ensure only the strong survive. It is the competition of daily life, in which the alienated worker is forced to engage. The noise produced is contradictory, seemingly chaotic yet arising from an instrument of order and harmony. Occasionally a melody filters through the madness, but it is soon lost in the utter confusion of the city, the noise of traffic, of relentless war, of the trading floor, of the disturbed mind. Imitating the factory and the process of mass production, Macdonald initially shows only the component parts of the machine, revealing more through montage, assembling the final product. Interspersed between shots of the frantic machine is a counting clock, which racks the tension to almost unbearable levels. I wished it to stop, yet it continued. As it finally and abruptly finished I walked into the adjacent room, aware due to the piercing screech that this next film had already started.

Brakestand (1998) is a fifteen minute looped video of the artist sat in a BMW with one foot on the accelerator and the other on the brake, the rear wheels spin helplessly, whining and burning as the car remains stationary. With this single motionless act dominating the entire film, Macdonald contradicts the purpose of both car and video. Instead of a narrative or journey he provides a meditative experience, I sat and watched and knew it won’t end for another 14 minutes, but sat anyway. The work is described by the artist as a comment on the economy and consumerism, made in 1998 it remains particularly relevant given the current crisis. I also took the film to be an attack on ‘common sense’, the fallacy that pervades all economic and cultural debate. We expect, we know, that at some point the car will rush forwards, but it never does. As with 9000 Pieces I was held in perpetual anticipation. What I knew was right was shown to be false.

As I exited I walked past Ritardando a poco a poco (2010), a long musical score of the earlier work 9000 Pieces, made by watching slow motion footage of the machine and transcribing the notes as best as possible. I had earlier rushed past this work, but looking at it again I now understood its significance. It is the position we find ourselves in, it is the inherently flawed and pointless task of retrospectively analysing what has happened. Based on fragmentary evidence it gives not a precise explanation of what occurred nor what will occur. The pointlessness of the score is the pointlessness of the many attempts to produce a single objective understanding of the world.

Leaving the gallery, the sounds of the films become a memory, and standing amidst the silent concrete of the south bank the truth of it all comes clear. Modern life is horrible; disconcerting, repulsive, vile to the ears and mind. We are immiserated, alienated, and the machines we are told will free us merely accelerate the process. We engage in the fruitless tasks of attempting to understand the past with fragmentary evidence, when only lived experience will provide answers. Our expectations that things will change is toyed with, and ultimately shown to be false. The only way the chaos will ever stop and things will move forward is if we take direct action, run at the screen, smash the factory, and grab the leg from the brake.

At the Hayward Gallery until the 14th of February.

Jacob Charles Wilson considers the problems of categorising Dean’s latest work, and whether it presents a fitting tribute to film.

Tacita Dean’s 11 minute silent eulogy to celluloid at the Tate Modern presented a problem when writing this review; would it be categorised as a film showing or an art exhibition? By virtue of its title and medium the answer should be obvious, however the work is much more complex. I believe it would be better described as an ‘experience’; exhibiting qualities of both cinema and gallery installation.

The art object is defined by its physicality, whether it be an oil on canvas or bronze sculpture, in contrast the film is a series of projected images, the celluloid itself is of no concern, existing merely as a helpful medium for the recording of such images. Dean’s oeuvre however has been defined by its attempts to address the physical nature of the film. The labour of carrying rolls of film, of meticulously cutting and sticking and the time spent contemplating and processing, cause, in her words, analogue films to made and seen quite differently to digital.

Various features have been employed throughout the exhibition, as in Brechtian theatre, to deny the seduction of the viewers senses, here in order to remind us of the physical nature of film and the process by which it has been made. I was made constantly aware, by the tracking holes visible on the projection, that the images flashing before my eyes had been carefully thought about, captured, and edited. The lack humans in the film prevents empathy, the lack of sound forces us to listen to the environment around us, I was reminded that I was merely an observer, uninvolved in the narrative.

Further confusion as to whether this is a display or film was brought about by the work’s sculptural qualities. The vertical format film is projected onto, rather than a screen, a vast monolith which stands a few metres from the end of the hall. It gives the work a presence that flat screens lack. I walked entirely around the projection, and was prompted to consider the aspects of film behind the camera or screen, the physical objects and labour we often forget about.

Dean shows us that film is a physical process, she celebrates the virtues of the medium. However this is in the context of the waning use of film and rise of digital cameras, the entire intention of this work is to remind us of the dying art of sooting on celluloid. Dean asserts that this isn’t a piece of nostalgia, as the very act of creating it shows the art isn’t dead.

Dean is trying to inspire the viewer by pushing the limits of celluloid, by shocking us she hopes to attract our interest. I saw parallels here with the avant-garde soviet film directors. Indeed the flash cut montage interspersed with tracking shots of steps instantly reminded me of the Odessa steps sequence in the Battleship Potemkin. However, the similarities I saw with the soviet directors made me question whether, if all that contemporary artists can do is regurgitate tropes from the earliest days of cinema, then perhaps film is indeed dead, or at least, stagnant.

For Dean though, my concerns for the medium are irrelevant, the importance of celluloid lies in the fact that, ‘its a beautiful medium, a different medium’. Though with the recent fall of Kodak, I worry whether this medium will last long.

Jacob Charles Wilson visits an exhibition of video journalism

This small exhibition of documentary photography, organised by Sky and located in the embankment level of Somerset House, summarised the state of mainstream journalism in 2011. There were no ‘art works’ as such, rather it presented select broadcast footage of five key events; the Egyptian, Syrian, and Libyan uprisings, the English riots, and the capture and killing of Gaddafi.

Technological progression over the past decade has lead to a huge increase in the quality and quantity of video footage captured. However perhaps the greatest change has been in the proliferation of viewing platforms, which has fundamentally changed how we consume news. The idea of the headline, a 6pm summary of events, has been replaced by live coverage. Images of corpses are no longer held for front pages but sent immediately to our handsets. The exhibition attempted an approximation to this experience through the different sized screens scattered around the small rooms.

For anyone alive today, the events of last year will be unforgettable. However in contrast to the violence, rage, and utter brutality that has occurred, all the footage seemed a little too palatable. The carefully chosen stills and artfully framed figures seemed perfect for the evening news or front pages, but lacked the immediacy of the raw footage or reportage taken by the rebels and reactionaries - the people actually involved. I believe anyone who has watched the film Syrial Killing or followed events live on Twitter will agree.

I questioned the intentions behind the publishing of these images. Being broadcast by Sky, a corporate entity, these images were published in order to sensationalise and sell, not to agitate. It is in the MSM’s interests to support the status quo, i.e. the situation that keeps them in their privileged position as news provider. State and corporate media will always report with a bias against dissident activites. The images of the English Riots were certainly presented differently to the ‘legitimate’ arab uprisings, there was little sympathy with these protesters.

I felt a certain disparity between the message the exhibition intended, and the facts it appeared to present. Being organised by Sky, it was no doubt designed to show off the quality of their journalism and the importance they play in covering events. However at the same time the exhibition’s reliance on mobile phones and DSLRs suggested that the technology that will ultimately make centralised news broadcasters defunct is already in the hands of the people.

Laura Marie Scott looks at how David Lynch’s artistic background has influenced some of his most famous films.

Although known predominantly for his surreal filmic creations such as Eraserhead (1977), Mulholland Drive (2001) and the popular ’90s TV show Twin Peaks, David Lynch could be described as something of a polymath; turning his hand at painting, photography, music, designing and running his own club in Paris, and even selling his own range of David Lynch coffee. It is, however, his background in painting that I want to explore; the way that this interest manifests itself in his films and the influence of some of his favourite painters on his work.

It was during his time studying to be a painter at Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts that Lynch began the crossover into film-making. Inspired by his idea of creating “moving paintings” (quoted in MacTaggart, 2010), Lynch produced his first short film, Six Men Getting Sick in 1967. The film combined sculpture and painting with animation projected over the top, and was designed to be played in a continuous loop with a recording of a siren being used as the soundtrack. Lynch used a similar technique, this time combining animation with actual film footage, in a second short film entitled The Alphabet (1968). It is in these early works that we most clearly see the meshing of art and cinema, yet that is not to say that the influence of traditional art forms is not embedded in his more well-known productions. Ideas that Lynch carried from his art school background can be picked up on both in interviews with the director where he discusses his directorial process and within the imagery and the narratives of his films themselves. It is also evident that painting is something that has stayed with Lynch throughout his life. He did not simply move from one medium to the other, he continues to paint and exhibit his artwork to this day. It is safe to assume that this passion for art is something critical to Lynch’s life, and that the influence of this interest is bound to carry over to his films in one way or another.

David Lynch, Burn Pinecone, 2009.

In an interview with The Guardian, Lynch names Francis Bacon (1909-1992) as his favourite painter. Anybody familiar with the work of both men will notice certain visual and thematic similarities between the two. The use of dark, murky colours and areas of light and shadow to create a representation of form is key to much of Bacon’s work. This is depicted in Head VI (1948), particularly in the way that the outline of the head is not made clear and instead blends into the darkness of the picture’s background. Bacon’s use of colour is mirrored in Lynch’s own paintings where greys, blacks and browns tend to predominate. In his film work, this aesthetic is made most clear in INLAND EMPIRE (2006) which was shot entirely on digital video, a fairly low quality medium in comparison to the clarity of analogue. Kristin M. Jones argues that, “With INLAND EMPIRE his art and cinema draw closer together – his digital video approaches the paintings’ impossible spaces, exaggerated figures, murky tones. It’s replete with distortion: bodies that float uncannily from backgrounds, wide-angle close-ups deform faces, darkness bleeds outwards, light burns out details.” (cited in MacTaggart, 2010). It seems that the decision to use this lower quality medium was precisely to achieve this feeling of mystery and uncertainty, and the idea of figures and objects being hard to distinguish from their surroundings seems like it could be drawn directly from one of Bacon’s many paintings from the Head series. Another key similarity is the use of the mouth as a signifier for strong emotion, also seen in Head VI and other paintings from the series and generally considered to be one of the key themes in Bacon’s work. During moments of heightened emotion Lynch will frequently include an extreme close-up on the human face, with the mouth seeming to be at the centre of the image, which is in contrast to many directors who would choose to use the eyes as a focal point for emotion. This scene from INLAND EMPIRE also uses the distortion of the camera lens to draw attention to the mouth and create an increased sense of horror.

Francis Bacon, Head VI, 1949.

As well as these obvious similarities, Martha Nochimson (1997) argues that Bacon’s true influence on Lynch’s film-making was the idea of the subconscious, stating that Bacon’s primary aim was to, “engage the viewer in the paint first through the ‘nerves’, in Bacon’s words, and only belatedly through thought”. He also discussed, in interviews with David Sylvester, the idea of “the will to lose one’s will.” Both Bacon and Lynch tend to avoid thematic analytical discussion of their work, and this is commonly seen in interviews with Lynch where he often seems to talk vaguely about how the events on-screen make you feel rather than what they might mean. Where it is common for many directors to have a detailed plan before they begin filming and to stick relatively closely to the script and storyboard throughout production, Lynch is known to work more spontaneously. Ideas come to him at random throughout the film-making process and often he will film scenes without even knowing yet how they will fit in to the general flow of the film. We can see through these points that Lynch relies heavily on his own subconscious in creating the films, and that he expects the audience to view the films in a similar way. The idea of “the will to lose one’s will” points towards a rejection of logical thought and an embracement of chaos, and this is also prevalent in the narratives of Lynch’s films. If we think about the character of Agent Dale Cooper in Twin Peaks, he is a man caught in between the world of rational thought and the world of the supernatural, which is linked to the subconscious. In order to solve the mystery of Laura Palmer’s death he has to embrace the spiritual side of the case, as it cannot be solved by rational thought alone -  indeed many of the clues come to him through dreams. However I think it is important to note in the case of both Lynch and Bacon that this does not mean that their works are devoid of meaning, for as Paul Valery states: “All the arts live by words. May not the prime motive of any work be the wish to give rise to discussion, if only between the mind and itself?” (Brighton, 2001). Each man’s insistence to avoid linguistic analysis of their works only leaves more points of debate open for fans and critics, and since no definitive intentions can be known, these discussions will be ongoing for as long as their work is still remembered.

Francis Bacon, Seated Figure, 1961. David Lynch, Agent Dale Cooper in Twin Peaks.

Both Nochimson (1997) and MacTaggart (2010) explore further ideas to do with the influence of art on Lynch’s films, including concepts of modernism, romanticism and baroque art, all of which are interesting ideas and worth further reading to anybody with an interest in his work, but appear to be mostly speculation as we do not know whether or not Lynch was himself interested in these ideas and movements. Overall, as well as the direct influence that we can note from specific artists, it can be said that a large part of what Lynch has taken away from his art background and put into his films is simply the attitude that he chooses to take to his work. Lynch goes against mainstream Hollywood cinema in that he emphasises visual elements over narrative, and yet somehow manages to remain on the fringes between Hollywood and art cinema nevertheless. Whereas cinema was once considered a low art form, distinctions are becoming increasingly blurred and cinema is now appreciated by many as more than just entertainment. What this article intends to remind the reader is that art works need not be limited to their specific medium, different mediums can interplay with each other creating new and exciting art forms.

Further Reading and References:

• Brighton, A. (2001) Francis Bacon. Tate Publishing.
• Freud, S. (1919) The Uncanny.
• MacTaggart, A. (2010) The Film Paintings of David Lynch. Intellect Ltd.
• Nochimson, N. (1997) The Passion of David Lynch. University of Texas Press.
• Renner, R. (2002) Hopper. Taschen.
• David Lynch Interviewed by Gaby Wood
• David Lynch interviewed by Mark Kermode

Jacob Charles Wilson gives an introduction to his current thought on art and crisis.

This current economic crisis is like no other, will these unique circumstances produce new insights into and critiques of art?

Undoubtedly, though despite the rapid and radical political developments worldwide, the critical response to art appears to be taking its time. Popular content, newspapers, are still largely concerned with the cost of individual artworks. This is a valid question, but what needs to be directly addressed are the bigger questions; the place of art in a networked society, whether it can or should remain in institutions, and the roles & the people it serves by being there.

The reason I imagine there is such little uptake is that much of the thought formulated in the twentieth century, by figures in the Frankfurt school and elsewhere, still appears to be relevant today. Walter Benjamin’s 1936 essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction was so far-sighted that it remains relevant in discussions of images on the internet. Though as the crisis, or crises, deepens we will need to formulate new perspectives to suit our new context.

What drove the Frankfurt School was their political motivations, perhaps the current lacklustre response is due to an aversion of politicising art.

I do say I worry for the future of criticism having witnessed this aversion first-hand. During the strike of the 30th of November there was a student at the Courtauld who stated, ironically during a lecture on patronage in the Renaissance, that “art isn’t about politics”. It was disheartening to see such an intelligent student at one of the greatest artistic institutions unable or unwilling to grasp the concept that politics is integral to the creation and understanding of all arts: When a person makes an artefact they necessarily make choices which will be determined and influenced by the economic and social context, likewise our reading of history is based on contemporary concerns.

This view of art as politically neutral is wrong, rather we are saturated with neoliberal politics. It is merely presented to us as normal, which is what any hegemony does to legitimise its rule. When someone presents any view that conflicts with the prevailing ideology it is easily noticed, and decried dangerously subversive. Thus a poster telling us to buy something is ‘apolitical’, sensible, normal, a poster telling us not to buy anything is ‘political’, de-stabilising, and dangerous. The idea that you can escape a political reading or critique of art is completely wrong, thus people shouldn’t be afraid of expressing opinions.

Would you agree though that art criticism may become more political due to radicalisation?

I certainly hope so. The good sign is that this crisis is producing a much more sensitive, critically aware viewer. It’s been an educative process for everyone, where once we were decried as the apathetic ‘ipod-generation’ we are now ‘dangerous anarchists’. For the first time, the children of Thatcher have been shown that there is an alternative to the permanent crisis that is capitalism. Hopefully we will now use this new-found position to stage attacks and critiques on art and culture.

Do you see much in the way of radical artists?

The public’s expectations of what constitutes radical have moved so quickly. In 2004 all was required was that you spray paint a few rats. In most of the public’s eyes, you still only have to smash some old pots. These artists’ aren’t radical, they are dependant on their rich clients, the result is they are tame, their works full of shallow comment and devoid of critical insight, demands, or solutions. They are not active, but reactive.

The real radicals are groups like Voina, the Russian art/protest group. Their artworks and protests are totally fused into what is almost a ‘situation’; the fire-bombing of a police van, some would say that is art. In Britain we had the DSG, producing beautiful, intelligent propaganda, and most importantly, unafraid of showing humour. What defines the good artist is a phrase passed around recently, ‘Full Communism, with lulz as a transitional demand’.

You must remember though that curators are just as important as artists, it is through them we experience and record the works. I was incredibly happy to see Goldsmith’s far-sighted project to collect and display banners and placards from last years protests. 2011 has been paralleled with 1968, but I believe 1848 is closer with regards to long-term consequences. It is necessary that radicals record these worldwide movements rather than leaving it to reactionaries.

What is your opinion on the place of art in crises?

I have fought with this question for many months now. Is the creation of art a key part of emancipation, such as in the process of making propaganda, or is it a distraction from the matters at hand, clothing, food, and housing. Art production simply won’t stop despite the crisis, to make art is a defining feature of humanity, if we lost that then it would be an abject existence. Though art production could be deliberately stopped in a cultural strike to immiserate the leisure classes.

Art should remain relevant though, this may require art forms to change beyond what we today recognise. This could be through the processes of either postmodern reproduction & détournment, or remodernist production. Undoubtedly though, radical art will encompass new technologies, as Lucky PDF said the other day, “Artists who aren’t trying to deal with the implications of new media on society just aren’t making relevant work”.

Ultimately the place of art in a crisis should be not to mimic or interpret the world, but to change it.

Image making is what defines humanity; the moving image is what defines the modern era. But the moving image is a deception, it does not really move, rather we see, in rapid succession, a series of images capturing a moment of movement. This image, which suspends the ephemeral, has existed throughout art history: It is the turned head of a bison in flight, the lifted foot of an athlete, the swirled mass of snowstorm at sea.

Thus we find the film is linked to earlier art, yet at the same time it remains separate. With the film, we perceive differently, we are able to capture movements unseen until the last century. We can imagine slow motion, the flash-back, and forward. When we experience events, such as a ship sinking, we describe them ‘as if being in a film’. The film shapes and records our perceptions of modernity, just as the artwork shapes and records the ideas of the past.

The writings posted here will often, as we see with contemporary works, blur the distinctions between art and film. Today there are installations which utilise film, and film showings which become more like installations. As moving imagery becomes more prominent in our lives, thanks to the availability and distribution of recording technology, the already thin line between art and film, will fade out.