Figuring Landscapes is a multifaceted title. The phrase suggests the idea of forming landscape, as in ‘configure’; it suggests analysis and interpretation of landscape, as in ‘figuring out’ the subject; it could also imply peopling the landscape with figures. It thus compresses into a single phrase the making, reading, and inhabiting of landscape, which is after all what our lives are about: where we choose to settle, how we mould our environment, how we see ourselves within that environment, spatially and historically.
- Malcolm Andrews, ‘Impressing the Landscape: Place and Human Presence in the Recent Work of British Moving Image Artists’
Exhibitions
Figuring Landscapes premiered at ArtSway in the New Forest from 25 – 30 November 2008, the tour launched at Tate Modern, London, 6 – 8 February 2009.
The tour continues throughout the UK, Ireland and Australia during 2009 – 2010:
Australia
Melbourne Cinémathèque, 31 March and 7 April, 2010.
Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane 10 – 12 July, 2009;
Ivan Dougherty Gallery, Sydney 2 – 25 April, 2009;
United Kingdom
Dundee Contemporary Arts 23 – 27 February, 2009;
FACT, Liverpool 23 – 25 Feb & 2 – 4 March, 2009;
Vivid, Birmingham 25 – 28 February, 2009;
Showroom, Sheffield 30 March – 2 April, 2009;
Glimmer, The 7th Hull International Short Film 21 – 26 April, 2009;
Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff 3, 10, 17, 24, 27 May, 2009;
Site Festival, Stroud Valley Artspace 2, 9, 16, 23 and 30 June, 2009;
Cinecity – Brighton Film Festival 22, 28 & 29 November, 2009.
Ireland
Mermaid Arts Centre, Bray, Co. Wicklow 17, 24 and 26 September, 2009.
Program 1
7:00 – FIGURING LANDSCAPES: ENGAGEMENT
(1975-2007) 59 mins
The political, cultural & representational engagement with place & being on the land are simultaneously unpacked, celebrated & imaginatively reinvigorated in works by such filmmakers & artists as David Perry, Dominic Redfern & Eugenia Lim. This program explores sites of identity & anonymity that are scattered with markers of ownership & the history of humanity’s engagement with the environment.
8:10 – FIGURING LANDSCAPES: ENCOUNTER
(1983-2008) 67 mins
Landscape is experienced as a spatial encounter with specific places, as we journey across distance & memory, custom & industry, & on land, on water & through the air. Featuring key works by such filmmakers & visual artists as Andrew Kötting, Warwick Thornton, Catherine Elwes, William Raban, Tony Hill & Lyndal Jones.
9:30 – FIGURING LANDSCAPES: SURROUNDINGS
(2002-2008) 66 mins
The ambience of place resonates from the broad scope of the horizon to the intimacy of the closely observed. “Out there” the figure in the landscape is a rare sight, its image constructed from memory, materials to hand or construed from the abstract sensation of movement. Featuring work by Sofia Dahlgren, Steven Ball, Jo Millett & John Conomos.
Program 2
7:00 – FIGURING LANDSCAPES: ENACTMENT
(1952-2008) 67 mins
Figures in the landscape: polymorphous, animal, vegetable, mineral, visible or invisible. Human habitation writes & performs the landscape as much as the landscape inscribes & enacts human presence. These themes are explored by filmmakers & visual artists including Patricia Piccinini, Ben Rivers, Margaret Tait, George Barber & Tammy Honey.
8:20 – FIGURING LANDSCAPES: ANTI-TERRAIN
(1983-2007) 66 mins
Landscape is shaped by our relationship to it. Custodian-ship of the land & its efficacy transcends a human lifetime; as a result the physical shape of the environment & its cultural & imaginative formation will always be political. Featuring work by filmmakers & artists John Hughes, Destiny Deacon, Semiconductor, Peter Callas, Susan Norrie & Daniel Crooks.
9:40 – STONES IN THE BUSH
(1970-72) 74 mins
This program incorporates 2 early 1970s experimental documentaries that explore the relationship between Ned Kelly & the landscape tradition of Australian art & writing. A Stone in the Bush – Mick Glasheen, Martyn Sanderson & John Allen (1970) 26 mins. An impressionistic record of the location shooting of Tony Richardson’s Ned Kelly, featuring Mick Jagger & the music of The Rolling Stones. Kelly Country – Stuart Cooper (1972) 48 mins. Co-produced by Sidney Nolan & featuring a commentary by Orson Welles, Cooper’s essayistic documentary follows Nolan as he travels to various iconic locations.
catalogue can be requested from the original website
Figuring Landscapes
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