Image: Jane & Louise Wilson
Jane & Louise Wilson
Two artists whose film and photography illustrate the politics inherent in architecture and implications of technologies to our understanding of realities. They were nominated for the Turner Prize in 1999 and have exhibited internationally during a 30 year career. A screening of the art work “Dream Time” was included in The Astrologer Who Fell Into A Well” at CAS in Osaka.
www.303gallery.com
"Dream Time" documents the launch of the 2001 International Space Rocket at Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakstan. The Cosmodrome is the focal point of the Russian space programme. It was from here that in 1961 Yuri Gagarin became the first man who went into space and, more recently, where the IS.S star and sunrise were launched. They are architectural statements of authority in which culminated in the dream of conquering space.
A 35mm film the artists document the launch of the first manned space mission to the International Space Station. The footage moves between single and multiple views of the preparation surrounding and leading up to the launch.
"Less visually uncanny as a journey through the spaces of the Russian space programme, "Dream Time" establishes a visual complexity through the use of multiple images, converging into a single image track, all in the space of a single screen-projection. There is a clear narrative progression that makes this alternation seem less unusual then one might expect, adding up to a progressive montage that elucidates the passage towards flight.. It is the sound that returns us to the instability of such viewing, keeping it from just being a natural set of choices made by a news channel. The film tracks the build up to take-off for the first Russian flight to the International Space Station and Jane & Louise Wilson note the play between documentary and purposeful montage. describing the work as a "single-screen installation" edited so the narrative collapses moving between single and multiple views of the preparations and rituals, culminating in the launch itself. The visual part of Dream Time passes from interiors at the space station, which we see empty as the rocket launcher is wheeled out and into position. The sound shifts between clatterings, pre-recorded music heard through speakers, mission control announcements and music reminiscent of 1960s experimental electronica.
The audio is sometimes diegetic, but often out of time This phasing is heightened by moments where sound tracks collide over four different images. One key sequence shows the astronauts in military uniform walking into a glass walled room for a press assignation, here the sound is out of sync, I think slowed down to a slightly different speed of the images and played back on slight delay.
Jane & Louise Wilson are not critical, but instead using audio analytically to heighten the sense of something outside the normality, a sensation much harder to achieve at the turn of the century when it comes to space flight. At the same time it is not just a dematerialised celebration but one that is rooted in practical politics and mechanics of building and launching a space mission." Paul Hegarty - Rumour and Radiation: Sound in Video Art.
Two artists whose film and photography illustrate the politics inherent in architecture and implications of technologies to our understanding of realities. They were nominated for the Turner Prize in 1999 and have exhibited internationally during a 30 year career. A screening of the art work “Dream Time” was included in The Astrologer Who Fell Into A Well” at CAS in Osaka.
www.303gallery.com
"Dream Time" documents the launch of the 2001 International Space Rocket at Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakstan. The Cosmodrome is the focal point of the Russian space programme. It was from here that in 1961 Yuri Gagarin became the first man who went into space and, more recently, where the IS.S star and sunrise were launched. They are architectural statements of authority in which culminated in the dream of conquering space.
A 35mm film the artists document the launch of the first manned space mission to the International Space Station. The footage moves between single and multiple views of the preparation surrounding and leading up to the launch.
"Less visually uncanny as a journey through the spaces of the Russian space programme, "Dream Time" establishes a visual complexity through the use of multiple images, converging into a single image track, all in the space of a single screen-projection. There is a clear narrative progression that makes this alternation seem less unusual then one might expect, adding up to a progressive montage that elucidates the passage towards flight.. It is the sound that returns us to the instability of such viewing, keeping it from just being a natural set of choices made by a news channel. The film tracks the build up to take-off for the first Russian flight to the International Space Station and Jane & Louise Wilson note the play between documentary and purposeful montage. describing the work as a "single-screen installation" edited so the narrative collapses moving between single and multiple views of the preparations and rituals, culminating in the launch itself. The visual part of Dream Time passes from interiors at the space station, which we see empty as the rocket launcher is wheeled out and into position. The sound shifts between clatterings, pre-recorded music heard through speakers, mission control announcements and music reminiscent of 1960s experimental electronica.
The audio is sometimes diegetic, but often out of time This phasing is heightened by moments where sound tracks collide over four different images. One key sequence shows the astronauts in military uniform walking into a glass walled room for a press assignation, here the sound is out of sync, I think slowed down to a slightly different speed of the images and played back on slight delay.
Jane & Louise Wilson are not critical, but instead using audio analytically to heighten the sense of something outside the normality, a sensation much harder to achieve at the turn of the century when it comes to space flight. At the same time it is not just a dematerialised celebration but one that is rooted in practical politics and mechanics of building and launching a space mission." Paul Hegarty - Rumour and Radiation: Sound in Video Art.
Image: Dream Time © Jane & Louise Wilson
