Campbell / Clarke / Wardill

Described by the artist as a film in which ‘Nothing happens’, Duncan Campbell’s new work is a homage to Samuel Beckett, the Irish playwright who summarised his entire literary output as ‘a stain upon silence.’ Campbell's film opens in a darkness that is both abstract and primordial and that is punctuated by spots of light as the film progresses.

Declan Clarke’s video Mine are of trouble 2006 deftly juxtaposes an account of the life of socialist Rosa Luxemburg against his own personal and haphazard introduction to the revolutionary figure while studying in Berlin. The political activist’s remarkable actions, which culminated in her assassination in 1919, are set in poignant contrast to Clarke’s failed attempts to transfer her political legacy to his own romantic life.

Set within earshot of the Hawksmoor Church, St Annes in Limehouse, Emily Wardill's 16 mm film Born Winged Animals and Honey Gatherers of the Soul is a visual and phonetic translation of a symbol that Nietzsche used to seek understanding of an individual's consciousness – the tolling of a church bell at noon.

Pressetext

Art Now Lightbox:
Duncan Campbell / Declan Clarke / Emily Wardill