Jane Arden Project

2011-10-28T04:35:00.000-07:00

Sheila Allen 1932-2011

I was very saddened to hear of the passing of Sheila Allen.
Taken from the Unfinished Histories website:

Sheila Allen had a long and distinguished career as an actress on stage and screen, and as a teacher and lecturer. She trained at RADA and appeared in many regional theatres before ten years at the RSC and later, several TV series. Her feminism and her friendship with playwright Jane Arden led to her involvement in the innovative feminist theatre piece 'Vagina Rex and the Gas Oven' at Drury Lane Arts Lab, 1969. She also appeared in Arden’s 'A New Communion for Freaks Prophets and Witches' at the Open Space and the film based on it, The Other Side of the Underneath. She went on to play the title-role in Pam Gems’s Queen Christina at the RSC. She continued to act and to teach at drama schools and institutions across London right up until her death on October 11th, 2011.

The Guardian Obituary

2011-02-02T02:43:00.000-08:00

Revolution & Rehabilitation Exhibition

A very interesting exhibition curated by Robin Simpson:

"The Schedule consists of a series of public screenings, performances and ensuing discussions that aim to examine the intersections between Radical Psychiatry and Art."

Arden's The Other Side of the Underneath features in the program.

http://www.redbirdstudios.org/exhibition

2010-12-13T06:58:00.000-08:00

Tourist Magazine Feature

A feature & interview for Tourist Magazine by Lillian Wilkie
http://www.touristmagazine.co.uk/?p=342

2010-11-30T06:05:00.000-08:00

Remembering Allies

Larger pictures here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/janeardenproject/

2010-11-15T15:58:00.000-08:00

Jane Arden Season Poster

Screen-printed posters will be available through out the season.

2010-10-16T13:13:00.000-07:00

Jane Arden Season

Jane Arden Season
8th-16th December 2010
At the Star & Shadow Cinema, Newcastle
http://www.starandshadow.org.uk/on/season/83

2010-05-24T00:38:00.000-07:00

Private View Thursday 3rd June

2010-05-24T00:24:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Lucy Jones

Beautiful posters designed and printed by Lucy Jones.
A limited selection of these will be on sale at the private view on Thursday 3rd June.

2010-05-16T08:22:00.000-07:00

2010-05-11T15:22:00.000-07:00

Returning to the sites of 'Separation' (1968)

Crane by the River Thames & All Saints Church, Isleworth,
Dean Hill Road, East Sheen and Mortlake Green.
May 2010.
Photographs by Laura Guy and Charlotte Procter.

2010-05-04T06:56:00.000-07:00

Artefacts

2010-04-28T00:30:00.000-07:00

Visiting 'The Other Side of the Underneath' (1972)

Newport Transporter Bridge, Cwmtillery Reservoir and St Paul's Church, Cwmtillery.
April, 2010
Photographs by Laura Guy and Charlotte Procter.

2010-04-26T05:22:00.000-07:00

Contributors: Hanna Tuulikki and Lucy Duncombe

Hanna and Lucy live in Glasgow where they occupy their time as visual artists, illustrators and musicians. They both have a fascination with the voice and the relationship of sound to image. As vocalists they are drawn towards experimentation both within song structures and free improvisation. Their practice is informed by the idea that song can be understood as a sculptural process that finds expression using the materials of the body, and thus, vocal sound making or song as portrait of the self.

Particularly in response to ‘Vibration’ and ‘Separation’ they have recorded a series of vocal improvisations alongside a set of photographic slides, seeking to assimilate the transformative aspects of Arden’s cinematic and sonic exploration.

Hanna performs and has recorded with Nalle, Two Wings, The Family Elan and Scatter. She makes place specific artworks and pen and ink illustrations.
http://www.myspace.com/nallemusic
http://www.hannatuulikki.com
http://community.thisiscentralstation.com/hanna_tuulikki

Lucy performs and records with the band Trees as well as in collaboration with other improvisers. She is in the final stages of an illustration degree where she creating a temporary record shop.

http://www.myspace.com/0trees0

2010-04-26T04:40:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Karen Constance

Karen Constance is a self taught artist living in Brighton, as well as being an artist she also plays experimental music with her husband Dylan Nyoukis as Blood Stereo and solo as Smack Music 7.

2010-04-24T09:17:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Victoria Jenkins

Victoria Jenkins is a photographer living in Hinckley, Leicestershire. Interested in the collision between logic and the irrational within the scientific discourse, Victoria bases her work on the visual expression of rational investigation, whilst simultaneously questioning the idea of truth within science.

http://www.victoria-jenkins.co.uk

2010-04-23T04:32:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Eleanor Jones

Eleanor Jones is an artist and writer currently based in Berlin, and an MA student from Goldsmiths in Interactive Media Art & Critical Theory, and previously Fine Art in Brighton. Her work encompasses sound, text, installation and film, exploring subjects such as Utopias, future urbanism, archives, and language. Eleanor likes to work both group projects, collaborations, and working solely.

2010-04-21T05:54:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Rowan Forestier–Walker

Rowan Forestier–Walker is a sound and visual artist based in Sussex.
Her interests lie in the exploration of perception, process, language and freedom. Using whatever is to hand, experiment, environment and craft are key elements. She works in collaboration and solo.

2010-04-20T13:20:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Colette Rosa

Colette Rosa grew up in Wales but is currently based in London.
Having recently graduated from Camberwell College of Arts, she makes art in the form of zines and music.
She volunteers at a number of radical archive collections and is a member of the London Zine Symposium 2010 Collective.

2010-04-19T09:52:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Aymie Backler

Aymie Backler is joint producer of The Smoking Cabinet Film Festival and it’s education wing Mirror Mirror. Both The Smoking Cabinet Film Festival and Mirror Mirror showcase and utilise early forms of visual media and amusements in order to educate and entertain audiences.
Aymie’s interest in the perceived magic of early photography and film techniques inform her current experiments with light sensitive paper.

2010-04-19T09:39:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Teal Gardner

Teal Gardner lives, very possibly, in the exact middle of the United States. She is 25. Her band is UUVVWWZ. Her bike is blue. Her studies are in Anthropology and English. She paints. She cooks o.k. She believes in collaboration and attitude. She loves the ocean & high altitude. She and her main pals are working on a zine called Particle.

goodymob.blogspot.com

2010-04-19T05:56:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Mia Clarke

Mia Clarke was born in Brighton, England. She plays guitar in Electrelane, based in England, and Follows, based in the U.S. She is a freelance writer and has written for publications including The Wire, The Guardian, Timeout and Pitchfork Media.

She also co-edited "The Art of Touring" with ex-Erase Errata guitarist Sara Jaffe, which was published by Yeti in 2009. She currently lives in Chicago, Illinois.

2010-04-19T03:36:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Jessica Anne Stockdale

Jessica Anne Stockdale is an artist and writer, born in Reading, Berkshire. Dissecting sexuality from its history, she is concerned with the slow seep of assiduous desire within the spaces between male and female subjectivity. Eschewing prescriptive meaning, her film, text, and installation works revel in the freedom of multiple interpretations.

2010-04-19T03:08:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Laura Guy

Laura Guy is an artist and writer interested in exploring the social and political dimensions of history making. She is MA Candidate in Durham University's Centre for Advanced Photographic Studies and a book 'that is, these scenes' will be published by the Midlands Arts Centre later this year.

(Blindly I will follow, 2008)

www.lauraedithguy.com

2010-04-19T02:59:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Sophie Brown

Sophie Brown is an artist, musician and curator based in London. She recently curated the Seripop event at BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art in 2009. Her interests are projects which touch on or concern the meeting point between music, performance and art.

2010-04-19T02:45:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Lucy Jones

Lucy Jones is an illustrator based in Manchester, UK. She works alone as well as in collaboration with other artists, in particular as one of the duo, Mount Pleasant, with David Bailey.She mainly works with pencil, print and ink on paper.

2010-04-19T02:13:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Susanne Bürner

Susanne Bürner lives and works in Berlin. Recent exhibitions and screenings include the Austrian Cultural Forum New York, South London Gallery, Temporary Kunsthalle Berlin, Zamek Ujazdowski Warsaw, Galerie Giti Nourbakhsch, John Hansard Gallery Southampton and DEPO Istanbul.

(Embodied Truth, 2008, DV on DVD, 5:30 min)

2010-04-19T01:07:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Katie Schwab

Katie Schwab is an artist living and working in London. She studied at Goldsmiths college and now co-runs LimaZulu Project Space and takes ceramics evening classes.

(O Sister, 2010)

www.katieschwab.com

2010-04-19T01:00:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Anna Peaker

Anna Peaker is an illustrator and designer based in Leeds whose work draws inspiration from the ideas of ritual, pattern and the surreal.
She has exhibited her work in Bristol, Chicago, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds and London.
In 2009 her work was published in LURVE magazine and by Medium Rare, who published her zine "Feel Like a Ghost".
She frequently works on designing record sleeves, posters and on collaborative and personal projects.

www.annapeaker.co.uk/

2010-04-18T14:18:00.000-07:00

Contributor: Elaine Tierney

Elaine Tierney writes about early modern festival. As the current holder of an AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award, she is affiliated with Sussex University and the V&A. She joined the latter's Research Department in 2006, curating a section on spectacle and performance for the museum's Baroque exhibition in 2009.

Wenceslaus Hollar after Anthony Van Dyck
Margaret Lemon 1646
Etching 258 x 178 mm
The British Museum, London

2010-04-16T03:07:00.001-07:00

Jane Arden (1927- 1982) was a film director, actor, screenwriter, playwright, songwriter and poet.

In the late 1940s, after studying at RADA, her career started to form as she began to play parts on television and in London theatres. As the 1950s progressed, Arden concentrated on writing for stage and television, working with some of the key figures of British theatre and cinema such as Sheila Allen, Joan Simms, Jack Bond, David de Keyser, Alan Bates, Victor Spinetti, Albert Finney, Charles Laughton, Harold Pinter, and Philip Saville (whom she married). In the 1960s her work became increasingly radical as her interest and involvement in feminism and the anti-psychiatry movement grew. In 1969 she produced the play Vagina Rex and the Gas Oven, which ran to a packed house for six weeks at Arts Lab in London. From this she formed the radical feminist theatre group Holocaust and then wrote a play called A New Communion for Freaks Prophets and Witches, which was to become the film The Other Side of the Underneath (1972).

Arden died in 1982 and, after an initial tribute at the National Film Theatre in 1983, the films were suppressed; her name consequently fading from the public realm.

In 2009, the BFI re-released Separation (1967), The Other Side of the Underneath (1972) and Anti-Clock (1979), creating a previously unavailable platform for a new generation to see her work. However the depth and social relevance of this work commands that Arden’s output receive greater recognition and award her deserved status amongst her contemporaries.

By asking women artists to respond to the viewing of two of her films, Separation and The Other Side of the Underneath, this project aims to draw attention, not only to Arden’s work, but the influence and stimulus her work is able to bring to a new generation of artists, writers and filmmakers. Formed of two parts the culminating bookwork will first reproduce certain pivotal texts and new commissioned material that provide a contextual and biographical history of Arden’s oeuvre. Following this the second part will publish the contributions of a number of female artists, in the form of printed matter, audio and moving image. There will be an exhibition in June, showcasing the book alongside these multimedia works. This blog will operate as a space where a dialogue surrounding the work can develop, anchoring the progression of the project and acting as a point of information in relation to the expanded nature of my practice. Focusing on the import of her creative output in the contemporary dialogues of feminism and the anti-psychiatry movement, this active research project and the culminating bookwork will stress the still necessary endeavour to revisit and revaluate these radical histories.

Finally I need to thank Sean Kaye-Smith and the BFI for their kind support of this project.

Charlotte Procter