Premiere: Paperwork

Wednesday May 3rd 2006
4.00pm - 6.00pm

Wednesday May 3rd 2006
4.00pm - 6.00pm

University of Glamorgan
Premiere: Paperwork screening (approx 10mins)
Directions: The talk will take place in the Art Block, Main Campus, Trefforest. The room number is K131, which is a lecture theatre on the 1st floor.

Paperwork: is a short film made in Belgium and Wales by a collaborating filmmaker and artist. Paperwork examines lives suspended within Europe’s oldest and largest asylum reception centre.

Talk: Artist Glenn Davidson of Artstation and filmmaker Wyn Mason are joined by Nicholas Tresilian of Artist Placement Group (NKA O and I), the session will be chaired by Professor Stephen Lacey. Glenn and Wyn will discuss Paperwork from the perspective of their respective disciplines. Video documentation of the artist placement and background to Paperwork will be shown. The talk will be recorded, transcribed and later written as an article; contributions, thoughts and observations are invited at the talk. Refreshments and nibbles at 6.00 .

All welcome.

Systemic diagram of Paperwork

The following page was photographed and written by Owain Rees (15 years) whilst on an Artstation placement, with a little help from GD.

The talk started with Professor Stephen Lacey introducing Paperwork and the speakers.

Nicholas opened the discussion on Artist Placement Group (APG). Started in the 1960’s by John Latham and Barbara Steveni, he had been a founder member, he is now on the board of Artstation. He spoke of the legacy of APG and saw Artstation as a contemporary embodiment of the principle of artist placement. He pointed out that powerful technological tools were now available to the placement artist and that artists should embrace and pursue the concept of the open brief, a counter culture treatment for a “risk-averse” society.

Wyn and Glenn had spent a week in Belgium in the Le Petit Chateau filming Paperwork. Le Petit Chateau the asylum reception centre was described as an echoing gloomy place of stone walls and floors, containing nothing to do for the residents. Video Documentation was shown of the asylum seekers in discussion with the asylum reception centre placement artists, which included French physicist Herve Gouget. We then saw Paperwork, a 10 minutes split screen film made with asylum seekers. Discussion moved to the metaphoric principle behind the use of paper, used to contrast the institutional effect on the lives of asylum seekers. This was how the adjacent film frames were used, an idea initially influenced by the ex annePeople Show performer and film maker Mike Figgis in his film Timecode made in 2000.

Following on, comments and questions from the audience; artist Inga Burrows compared the references and use of paper in the film and the installation in the Old Library in Cardiff, home to the commissioning Cardiff 2008 European Cultural Capital bid team. She noted the duality of the installations delicacy and precision compared to the pieces of paper caught, torn and mutilated on screen.

Hamish Fife asked what the experience meant for the ethical behaviour of the artists. Glenn remembered the painful experience of hearing and recording residents stories which seemed to underlined the need for ethical conduct, a treatment radically contrasting that metered out by policy makers. Paperwork focussed on the predicament of people “suspended” in the system. Suspension evloved as the central metaphor for the exhibition and film seen here in key texts presented in the exhibition:

PAPERWORK suspends lives caught in the asylum seeker system.

Having the right paperwork can save the life of a refugee or asylum seeker.

Paperwork creates and maintains the potentials of the lives within the system.

Paperwork creates un-liveable and discontinuous lives.

Having paperwork can create new possibilities .

Prof. Stephen Lacey introduces the session.

Glenn describes phase 2 (Agora) of Paperwork - as a symantic diagramme

Nicholas Tresilian speakes about APG

A screen from Paperwork.

Wyn also spoke about his life and how he was deeply affected as a student by the situation of the miners strike in 1984. He had started out as an art student but turned his back at the time after graduating in Exeter. His carer was then in television as an independent filmmaker producing drama and documentary for the BBC.

He later became disillusioned by the industry, mainly with the lack of control he had over the end product. Working with Glenn had given him a new chance to be more in control. Wyn had bought in to the collaboration many expectations from his experiences in the industry. His first encounter with Anne Hayes of Artstation produced heavy conflict. Whilst Wyn proposed scripted and pre-shot material Anne had stressed a very different approach, one that defined the work as what was not required! – it should not be drama, should not be documentary and should not be boring gallery or artist film (Wyn notes) but needed to engage with audience. In the eventuality of making Paperwork, the movie contained sequences of paper in flight over landscape, caught in a thorn tree and in ragged pieces, decomposing at the seashore. These were in fact pre-shot as Wyn was unable to resist preparatory work.

Wyn and Glenn had worked together in the past, they are quite different from each other. Glenn who works with Anne retain their fine artist identities. This produced a range of interesting differences which became evident in the making of the Paperwork. Wyn’s use of meticulous planning in the creation of shooting scripts, rehearsals and general preparatory process behind drama and documentary making, he naturally expected to use within this new working context.

Glenn and Anne on the other hand have been drawn into a very different course of action. Relying on knowledge they have built up over the last 29 years of working together, they are interested in freeing themselves of external assumptions and influences. Responding instead, in a raw and un-censored way to situations and locations in a real-time response. Glenn spoke of the need for artists to move away from the curatorial model toward more self initiated projects. He eulogised over the APG’s “open brief” model. He referenced Artstation’s partnership and background in Cybernetics described it as the Art and Science of knowing or a system for observing systems. He introduced the Paperwork system diagram (top of page), showing the efficiency of the pictogram in systemic representation of the inputs, outputs and outcomes. Considerable Complexity of the project is conveyed in a singe image (see Agora pictogram created for the second phase of Paperwork), leading inexorably to the all encompassing nature of semantic images and representations. This was an introduction to Artstations pursuit of the single or core metaphor in their placements, it also shed light on how “suspension” emerged in the process of the placement and film.

Cardiff's Old Library Paperwork exhibition text introduced the film as follows :

Beneath, shining through the arch, a twin screen video installation. Video sequences cross the line between narrative (going somewhere) and composition and decompositions of paper (going no where). Images also contrast the rural and institutional. All actors in the video are asylum seekers and refugees suspended in European paperwork.

Paperwork will now be shown in its own right. The audience were finally asked to consider if the work stood on its own without the context of the installation and exhibition. The general feeling was that it could, but may appear somewhat abstract with no discernable narrative or dialogue. Further time would have been required to understand this more deeply.

We all departed to the art department for a glass of wine, joined by some of the remaining audience.
Artstation thank everyone who took part.

May 2006

A Glenn and Wyn moment...

Pictogram of AGORA - phase 2 of Paperwork ...