Monday 26 November 2007

Teaching an old Dubdog new tricks


Just finished the long due overhaul of the Dubdog website and uploaded it to my server. You'll notice a much less fussy feel, cleaner and pared back look. This is for several reasons, least of all to make it load faster as the previous site was constucted completely of images and several areas would hang in cyber space for a while before appearing. I also wanted to give a different emphasis to what Dubdog is and does now, one that is more representative of the sort of work I'm now doing and include more film and photography, while at the same time giving all work equal weight rather than having separate process headings. I've stripped some work out, put some new stuff in and dug up some old pieces that have never seen the light of virtual space. Finally, I didn't want the site to over power the work which I felt the old one was doing and there is now an aesthetic parity with Dublog. I hope that this one will last at least the couple of years the last one did before I become sick of the sight of it.

Saturday 24 November 2007

I Came, I Saw - Town Hall Galleries, Ipswich


Went to the private view of 'I Came, I Saw' last night, a cruel way to run a show me thinks - if you didn't make it into the show, and there was no way of knowing until the private view whether you had or not, you had to take your work away with you on the night! Saw some very dissapointed people carrying their work out of the door (as Jason said, this could have made an interesting art video in itself). So, I feel for those that didn't make it, especially as with some of the work chosen it was really difficult to see a link between the work and the exhibition concept (first impressions of Ipswich) although that's not to say the work wasn't good. While I like the fact the exhibition was an open submission, so anyone could submit, artist or not, I guess you'd find in any small town art scene clique that local artists will submit anything just to be seen to be in the loop and they probably measure their success against this. You do tend to see the same names again and again. You do tend to see the same work again and again as well. For this show you get the feeling that some artists looked through their portfolios in search of something to submit and there were some really tenuous links to the brief. And again, I have to agree with Jason, the more interesting pieces were those created especailly for the show and/or had a human connection. Having said that, I'm guilty of submitting old work myself (2005), but at least it did fit the brief. Shame my artist statement wasn't included (see below). Maybe the next exhibition shouldn't be open to those that call themselves artists at all because the fantastic thing about this show is that non-artists, people who have never exhibited before, get the chance to have their work displayed in the excellent Town Hall Galleries, a venue that is taking art directly to the people with it's central Ipswich location.

My absent artist statement:

"The first thing I remember seeing on a visit to Ipswich were its docks. Later, when I came to live here and discovered you could walk along the docks I became fascinated by these big bastard buildings. For a short period I worked near the docks and on a daily basis would walk past these monoliths of sheer function. I became fixated by these slabs of honesty and on learning they were going to be demolished knew that I had to record exactly how I saw these beasts. They are gone and they are missed, but here, at least, they are remembered."

Wednesday 14 November 2007

Big Issue Film Festival



Exciting news just in that on the heel of DigiDigitDigital being shown in New York last month, my previous film, Contractual Freedom, made in 2006, has been shortlisted for the Big Issue Film Festival and will be shown at The Barbican in London on 28th November.

Tuesday 13 November 2007

March of the Modernist



I've finally been forced to use my Flickr account. I only signed up to post comments on friends' photos and would normally post my own photos here. However, I went to the absolutely inspirational Modernist masterpiece De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill-on-Sea recently and took so many photos that are worthy of posting that Flickr seems the only option. I tend to get shutter finger happy when visiting awe inspiring buildings. Link to my Flickr account here. Thanks Mike for the tip off about DLW.

Sunday 11 November 2007

5 beam stare



Faces found in the beams of Anne of Cleves house in Lewes.

A quick plug



A quick plug for Daniel Eatock's first solo exhibition. Daniel's site can be viewed here and the exhibition info here.

Sunday 4 November 2007

Considerate construction

Dubdog's website is currently undergoing a major overhaul and should be relaunched before the end of the year. A combination of being sick of the sight of my site and the ever slowing of the internet made me realise Dubdog needs a bit of a rebrand to suit it's developments over the last 2 years. Announcements here soon.