Month: June 2017

On The Planters Art: An illustrated talk on films, maps and gardening
Friday 30 June, 3pm,
LUX Scotland
The Mitchell Library, Glasgow
Free, ticketed via Eventbrite

‘I am told there are people who do not care for maps, and find it hard to believe; here is an inexhaustible fund of interest for any man with eyes to see or twopence-worth of imagination to understand with!’ – Robert Louis Stevenson

‘The map does not reproduce an unconscious closed in upon itself; it constructs the unconscious’ – Gilles Deleuze

Artist and curator George Clark will present this illustrated lecture looking at ideas of perspective, categorisation and interpretation in cinema and art. Drawing from research for his ongoing film projects in Hong Kong and Los Angeles, he will present and discuss a diverse range of subjects from the 16mm Kodachome films of Californian gardener Albert Wilson, the history of bird watching and illustration in colonial Hong Kong and the visionary 1980 Centre Pompidou exhibition on cartography Maps and Figures of the Earth/Cartes et figures de la Terre. Central to the talk is exploration of maps as ‘instruments of travel and discovery, as well as sophisticated tools to dream.’ The presentation will draw on the writings of Jorge Luis-Borges and Gilles Deleuze, film work by South American emigres in Paris such as Hugo Santiago and David Lamelas and Raul Ruiz’s rare film on maps and labyrinths made to accompany the Pompidou exhibition.

Image: Cartes Et Figures De La Terre, catalogue cover, Centre Georges Pompidou, 1980.

A Distant Echo
71st Edinburgh International Film Festival
Tuesday 27 June, 18:10, Odeon Cinema 4
Thursday 29 June, 18:10, Odeon Cinema 4

The UK premiere of my film A Distant Echo will be held at the upcoming Edinburgh Film Festival (21 June – 2 July 2017).

“Breathtakingly rendered on 35mm film, the vast expanse of various Californian deserts provides a stage for the contemplative re-enactment of an Egyptian history. Based on archival research, Clark’s debut feature blends fact and fiction, the historical and the contemporary, and transcends cultural and geographical boundaries to reflect on the ongoing tensions between local and national politics. The hypnotic choral composition by Tom Challenger adds a meditative layer to the expressive stillness of the images. A profound and affecting audiovisual experience.” – EIFF 2017

Termite Workshop: Vegetal logic and the ecology of images
Fri 16 Jun 2017 / 10am – 6pm
LUX, Waterlow Park Centre
Details online

This one-day workshop led by artist and curator George Clark explores and develops key aspects of his practice, while drawing on the environment of Waterlow Park (where LUX is based). Participants will explore methods of filming and working with sound and image by drawing on the logics of gardening and the archeology of images. The day will consist of screenings, readings and practical projects, featuring the writings and works of figures such as Raul Ruiz, Hugo Santiago, Chen Chieh-jen, Hito Steyerl, Trinh T. Minh Ha and The Office of Culture and Design in Manila, amongst others.

Using the idea of Manny Farber’s Termite Art, participants will look at connections across art forms and geographies to collapse established histories and definitions of artistic and curatorial work, seeking a mode of entangled practice. The day will explore strategies of assemblage, disregarding the boundaries between disciplines; ways of working at the intersection of histories and cultures, to develop an entangled mode of production in dialogue with the ecology of images and expanded exhibition contexts.