‘My Diary is, as a personal witness, that of description and observation and speculation, pondering on what might be now: what is on the other side of that wall? that door? those closed curatins?’ – Ian Breakwell
Developed from Ian Breakwell’s published Diaries, these 21 short works provide an objective, compassionate, often humorous and bizarre view of events that happen around us daily.
Promotional Card for Breakwell’s Continuous Diary.pdf here. …
In the home is a domestic melodrama of absurd intensity in which newlyweds in their ideal home undergo a severe emotional trauma on their wedding night.
Members Newsletter from ‘Kettle’s Yard’ including Ian Breakwell’s exhibition invitation.pdf here.
Description card for Ian Breakwell’s works including ‘The News’, ‘In The Home’ and ‘The Sermon’.pdf here.
Press clipping describing Ian Breakwell’s works ‘In The Home’ and ‘The News.’ …
Catalogue for Biddick Farm Artists Video 1977 pdf here
“Of the origins of In the Mind’s Eye (1977) she (Tamara Krikorian) wrote:
“I thought about ways of approaching formalism through some sort of restricted narrative, and I used Rimbald’s poem ‘In Winter’ [describing a railway journey] as the structure of the work, while retaining obvious self-referral devices…concerned with the perception of video/TV per se.’
We hear her read the poem in French, …
‘Videotapes by British Artists – Galleria del cavallino, san marco 1725 venezia’, a programme of videotapes and installations, 1977. Includes information on ‘Interruptions’.pdf here …
‘Breeze’ and ‘Disintegrating Forms’ were both designed as multi-screen installations. Breeze consists of four TV monitors placed side by side, showing four different shots of water, the camera being placed and allowed to run for ten minutes in each case. Tapes 2 and 3 are shown here. Close up shots of water appear to relate to the surface of the screen, giving the illusion of a TV set containing water. In 2, rapid movements of the water relates to the scan line. …
‘Breeze’ and ‘Disintegrating Forms’ were both designed as multi-screen installations. Breeze consists of four TV monitors placed side by side, showing four different shots of water, the camera being placed and allowed to run for ten minutes in each case. Tapes 2 and 3 are shown here. Close up shots of water appear to relate to the surface of the screen, giving the illusion of a TV set containing water. In 2, rapid movements of the water relates to the scan line. …
‘This is a table-top tableau of personal items, toys, drinks, cigarettes, actions and non-verbal visual viewpoints.
Though each is innocuous enough on its own, there is a sense of malice-aforethought in the collection of things in time and space against an un-specific black background. This is a sketchbook on video. A noting of starting or end points. Certain and uncertain. This was the last video-art piece I made for several years and is exploratory of expressing my own position as a person at that time, …
Sections from ‘London Video Arts’ catalogue, 1978. pdf here. …
‘The installation comprises 60 old TV receivers. Some operate normally, some distort, ‘flash’, or show a picture only intermittently, others operate sound only..
Mounted on building scaffold around a room they are tuned to various TV channels with the sound volume very high. The atmosphere is one of Media overdose and fruitless activity as TV repair men (in white coats) constantly attend the sets attempting to correct the faults…’ David Hall, 1972
This was the first multi-screen video/TV installation to be seen in a UK gallery. …
