2020 lockdown

The Madelvic Dinner

During lockdown, I came across a photograph on the Living Memory Association Facebook page of a large group of Madelvic Wire Works employees - all male - taken at a formal dinner event in 1965. The photo had a cinematographic quality which reminded me of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining.

For this new video I reused photographs I took a few years of the derelict car factory, as well as video of a mixed media work entitled ‘The Works’ I created last year. I added the new soundscape ‘Husk’ created by musician/composer Harry Bongo with whom I have collaborated on numerous occasions.

The video evokes the eeriness this derelict building represents, grasping the forgotten sounds of workers’ conversations and the drafts blowing through the broken windows and doors, now all boarded up.  

The Madelvic Factory is on the ‘at risk register’ of Buildings in Scotland, and a ‘Listed’ building on the national register. 

Art and Music

I produced a video about the work of artist Ian Reddie. Ian has been an artist for a decade or so, but recently inactive, for personal reasons. The idea was to present a retrospective of all the paintings, a chance to review where it all started and how his output changed over the years. This would allow him to take stock and decide on his next move.

I commissioned Edinburgh-based musician/composer Harry Bongo to create a sound tracks suitable to accompany Ian's paintings.  The sound had to evoke a dessert setting, bleached by the sun, rugged, desolate, but also beautiful and introspective. Let me know what you think!

Online art gallery for granton:hub

Despite planning for a number of art exhibitions at granton:hub in January-February this year, we then hit lockdown and the closure of Madelvic House.

A quick re-think about what I could do next and a Zoom meeting with some of the artists, made me decide to make some videos, as an online exhibition alternative.

All the videos are uploaded on the new granton:hub YouTube Channel.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_UH8qG5Jn2hgbhQP5cr51A/

For the video about photographer Paul Cunningham,  I collaborated again with musician Harry Bongo who produced a new sound track entitled 'Scapes'. I had already selected some of Harry's tracks (from his Album Harry Bongo, 2015)  for some of the other granton:hub videos, but Harry was keen to come up with some new ambient music. And I wanted to have more of an input too. So Paul sent around 40 photos, and I decided to make a selection to create a tour, with Scottish landscapes, rivers and lochs, and then the Forth Railway Bridge, harbour views and Edinburgh city centre, at night. The ambient track mapped very well on the photos. Have a look and let me know what you think via artingranton@grantonhub.org.