Lecture – Rachel Garfield, Will Fowler
10 March 2021, 4:00 – 5:00 PM, Online event – Book tickets
This event is organised by the Paul Mellon Centre in collaboration with the BFI and University of Reading.
Shadows From Light, commissioned and screened on Channel 4, grew from the recognition of a shared language and mutual respect between an older and younger artist. The film is an evocative and poignant visual homage. It is also a reflection on their convergent influences and models of art practice through Surrealism and its legacies. The film is shot in black-and-white, juxtaposing live models and Bill Brandt’s photographs, offering a performative approach to his work through a replication of Brandt’s signature tonal contrasts and atmospheric camera. The film is also an example of Dwoskin’s intermidiality, in its use of Alice in Wonderland as a metaphor as well as a rumination on the relationship between photography and film. The visual approach of the film is one of an atmospheric biography that was in some ways a prologue to Steve’s own autobiographical film, Trying to Kiss the Moon.
Rachel Garfield (Reading University) will be discussing with Will Fowler (BFI) the approach to the film with regards to the complex visuality and its relationship to Dwoskin’s thinking as well as how it reflects his homage to the photographer Brandt. Garfield will also discuss the film through her own friendship with Dwoskin as a further inter-generational discussion between artists.
Watch the Film
Shadows From Light: The Photography of Bill Brandt (Stephen Dwoskin, 1983) is available to watch for free in advance of the talk here
Featured image: Still from Shadows From Light: The Photography of Bill Brandt (Stephen Dwoskin, 1983). Courtesy of BFI.
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Text by the Paul Mellon Centre
artreading.org 