Relational
Relational is curator and co-ordinator of the overall Anti-Bodies programme. It is also commissioning a series of projects as part of Anti-Bodies.
Melanie Jackson International Fauna
2010
Duration: 2"55"
Speaker key - volume up or volume down
Melanie Jackson's new work, International Fauna, is a blast, an anti-anthem, a parade of the animal symbols designated by nation states quick change through a background of digital colour fields.The representations are matched back with their animal call, for the duration of the image - a concrete composition of the absurd. The work delights in these extraordinary attempts to project national values onto an animal form, and in the forms they have taken.
The film was commissioned by Relational and produced with Animate Projects and Picture This. It is available to view online on this page (click on play above), at Animate Projects, Vimeo and can be downloaded from iTunes.
Animate Projects commissioned writer, artist and architect Stephen Beasley to write an essay on the work. You can see Melanie Jackson, Stephen Beasley and Gary Thomas in person discussing International Fauna at the Gallery Launch at Picture This, Bristol on 8 May.
> Essay by Stephen Beasley> Gallery Launch at Picture This> International Fauna Poster (front)> International Fauna Poster (back)International Fauna Gallery Launch
Saturday 8 May 2010Picture This Atelier Mardyke Ferry Road, Spike Island, Bristol (UK) BS1 6UU+44 (0) 117 925 7010office@picture-this.org.ukhttp://www.picture-this.org.ukScreening 12.30-5.30pmTalk 2pm
Admission FreeMelanie Jackson in conversation with writer, architect and artist Stephen Beasley and Gary Thomas, Co-Director of Animate Projects. Introduced by Zoe Shearman, Director of Relational.
This event is the first gallery screening of the work. Drinks and refreshments provided.
Melanie Jackson is a London-based artist with recent solo exhibitions including, Road Angel, Arnolfini, Bristol, and Made in China, Matt's Gallery, London. She is showing The Ur-pflanze (Part I) at The Drawing Room (28 April - 20 June 2010). Much of her practice has been concerned with the flow of international capital. She is currently investigating the relationships between nature and technology through a series of experiments with fauna and flora, and the technologies available to her.
Melanie Jackson is represented by Matt's Gallery.
Stephen Beasley is an architect, artist and writer based in London. He co-founded the multi-disciplinary practice FlatPack001 in 1999 with his brother Mark Beasley. Recent work includes ‘FLUFFERS II’, published as part of Celine Condorelli’s Support Structures, the exhibition design of group show ‘Sudden White’ at the Royal Academy, and the experimental radio play ‘ADVENTURE: Showdown at the Pig Palace’, released by Junior Aspirin Records. He is currently a senior project architect at Manalo & White and a contributor to Frieze magazine.
Gary Thomas is co-director of Animate Projects, a London based agency, developing initiatives that explore the relationship between art and animation, and the place of animation and its concepts in contemporary art practice. APL also publishes APEngine, an online space for critical comment on a range of independent moving image work.
International Fauna is commissioned by Relational with support from Arts Council England and produced with Animate Projects and Picture This. With thanks to Ed Atkins and Katerina Athanasopoulou.
