28 July – 9 August 2020
grounded is a season of online screenings that brings work together under the framework of Screendance, a term that signals an affinity between choreographic and cinematic approaches to art practice, an attraction between dance and film that is as old as cinema itself.
Supported by the University of Brighton and focusing on artists predominantly based in the south- east of England and London, grounded proposes a way of thinking about movement as a political act. Set against the backdrop of Covid-19, the season considers the variety of ways artists use movement in video and film to explore the relationship of the body to society, of confinement to imagination, and health to politics. Much like the Danse Macabre, a medieval allegory about the equalising power of death, the programme is a space, albeit virtual, where we can reflect on questions around solitude and communication, community and identity, solidarity and our futures.
grounded echoes the approach of those working in grounded theory who gather materials together to understand the social conventions that affect how people act and relate to each other. The season asks how we may break new ground in developing a social fabric that is welcoming, how we traverse boundaries and dissolve conventions, how we nurture newness and mourn what we have lost, how we remember and how we forget, how we explore what it means to be human.
The programme is composed of five online screenings, each appearing online for 24 hours from 6pm, and is hosted by Coastal Currents, Hastings UK. Curated by Claudia Kappenberg, University of Brighton and Fiontán Moran, Tate Modern.
#groundedscreendance
LIST OF ARTISTS:
Jordan Baseman, David Blandy, Holly Blakey, Lucy Cash, Lisa Clifford, Phoebe Collings-James, Hugh O’Connor, Oona Doherty, Dave Tynan, Becky Edmunds, Adham Faramawy, HRH, Evan Ifekoya, Onyeka Igwe, Fenia Kotsopoulou, Andrew Kötting, Paul Maheke, Zoë Marden, Ursula Mayer, Harriet Middleton Baker, Graeme Miller, Hugh O’Connor, Harold Offeh, Florence Peake, Sally Potter, Yvonne Rainer, Ben Rivers, John Smith, Eve Stainton, Dave Tynan, Rosa-Johan Uddoh, Cheryl White, Gray Wielebinski.
Screening 1: Tuesday 28 July 6pm – Wednesday 29 July 6pm
interior worlds / exterior lives
Image credit: Paul Maheke, Tropicalité, l’île et l’exote (2014) video still. Courtesy the artist
An exploration of the construction of boundaries and space, and how bodies move within and across them.
Screening 2: Thursday 30 July 6pm – Friday 31 July 6pm
socialised
Please note there is nudity and sexual content in this screening which we would advise isn’t for under 18’s
Image credit: Eve Stainton & Florence Peake, Fantasy series EP01 (2018-19), video still. Courtesy the artists
A reflection on the conscious and unconscious movements that affect how we shape and form our place within society. Featuring work by Evan Ifekoya, Onyeka Igwe, Florence Peake, Eve Stainton, Rosa-Johan Uddoh, and Gray Wielebinski.
Screening 3: Tuesday 4 August 6pm – Wednesday 5 August 6pm
taking / care
Image credit: Gray Wielebinski, HRH, water bb (2019), video still. Courtesy the artists
An investigation into the embodiment of loss, uncertainty and that which we cannot name. Featuring work by Lisa Clifford, Phoebe Collings-James, Amy Greenfield, HRH, Fenia Kotsopoulou, Zoë Marden, Florence Peake, Yvonne Rainer, John Smith, Cheryl White, and Gray Wielebinski.
Screening 4: Thursday 6 August 6pm – Friday 7 August 6pm
1 + 1 = 3 / narratives
Image credit: Andrew Kötting, Because the Rest is Silence (2020), film still. Courtesy the artist
An exploration of how our bodies try to make sense and the stories we tell. Featuring work by David Blandy, Lucy Cash and Simone Kenyon, Oona Doherty, Becky Edmunds, Evan Ifekoya, Andrew Kötting, Hugh O’Connor, Harold Offeh, Sally Potter, and Dave Tynan.
Talk: Saturday 8 August, 3 – 5pm – LIVE ON FACEBOOK
grounded discussion
Screening 5: Saturday 8 August 6pm – Sunday 9 August 6pm
Graeme Miller Wild Car (2020)
Image credit: Graeme Miller, Wild Car (2020), video still. Courtesy the artist
A chance to see Graeme Miller’s new film Wild Car, a trauerarbeit for Europe – shot in the winter of 2019 and edited under lockdown.
Curator biographies
Claudia Kappenberg (b. 1963, Muenster, GER) is a performance and media artist and Principal Lecturer at the University of Brighton, UK. She is a founder-editor of The International Journal of Screendance. Recent writing has been published in Performing Process: Sharing Dance and Choreographic Practice (2018), The Oxford Handbook of Screendance Studies (2016), Syncope in Performing and Visual Arts (2017) and Art in Motion: Current Research in Screendance (2015).
Fiontán Moran (b.1986, London) is Assistant Curator at Tate Modern where he recently co-curated exhibitions on the work of Steve McQueen and Andy Warhol. He is the founder of the zine Death Becomes Herr and is part of the queer performance collective CAMPerVAN.
