Online platform commissioning artists within a DIY TV show format
TRANSMISSIONS returns for Season 2 comprising eight episodes with contributions from BBZ TV, Juliet Jacques, Ignota Books, Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Kat Anderson, Plastique Fantastique, and many others!
All forms of community are now more important than ever, and it is vital that we find mechanisms to support each other through this precarious time. In the landscape that we have found ourselves in, many artists, writers and thinkers have had exhibitions, opportunities and subsequent fees postponed or cancelled. In response to this, we have established TRANSMISSIONS an online platform that commissions artists to share their work within a classic DIY TV show format.
9 September, 9PM BST
Replay: 11 September, 9AM BST
Kat Anderson: Bad Man Nuh Flee
Kat Anderson will show a collection of audio/visual notes on oppression, black liberation and the white imagination.
Kat Anderson is a visual artist, filmmaker and curator working under an artistic and research framework called Episodes of Horror, which uses the genre of horror to discuss representations of mental illness and trauma as experienced by or projected upon Black bodies in media. Kat has a deep interest in Diaspora identities, Black queer cultures and Black trauma and mental illness. In 2016 she co-curated Jamaican Pulse: Art and Politics from Jamaica and the Diaspora for the Royal West of England Academy, Bristol. Recent work includes a commission from KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin for her on-going project Episodes of Horror, which explores the subjects of horror and trauma, as experienced by or projected upon Black bodies in lens-based media and literature. Anderson did a residency at Metal (Liverpool) in 2018, where she examined seminal moments of civic and personal change, looking at the historic and contemporary intersection of race, poverty and mental illness in the lives of Black Liverpudlians. Her first solo exhibition which opened in September 2019 was Restraint Restrained at Block 336.
16 September, 9PM BST
Plastique Fantastique Communiqué: Beware Mars with Earth in Ascendance
On 30 May 2020, at 3:52 pm EDT, Plastique Fantastique watched the Spacex Falcon 9 rocket carry NASA personal (for a fee) to the International Space Station and thought, as below, so above (next stop the moon, then Mars)… there is much today, down here, that needs our urgent attention… and there is much in the future, up there, to worry about too (including one million people living on Mars by 2050 as the first stage of planetary colonisation)… Earth views Mars as a planetary symbol for the cocksure warrior, and for violence, passion, assertion, and the weaponization of skill and sex… above all, Mars is the sign of competition (and Mars is a goal for commerce)… Mars is not this Mars though... That land is not that land… We know a different Mars (we have been there)… It is the hominids of Earth that have projected this image (of themselves) onto Mars… all other animals know this… Mars as ruling planet is not to be feared… it is Earth as ruling planet (Earth in Mars and the Mars in Earth) that we need to worry about…
For episode two of the second series of Transmission2020, Plastique Fantastique, with Gentle Stranger, Christopher Kirubi and Arianne Churchman & Benedict Drew, offer moving images, stories and songs about planetary problems, below and above. The broadcast will feature clips from a film by Plastique Fantastique commissioned by Southwark Park Galleries.
Juliet Jacques: Spectres of Socialism
W/ Bill Morrison / Colin Newman / Deimantas Narkevičius / The Duvet Brothers /
Erica Scourti / Igor & Gleb Aleinikov / Jasmina Cibic / John Smith / Kerry Tribe / Octavio Cortázar / Oleksiy Radynski / R W Paul / Santiago Álvarez
Less than a year after the UK's traumatic General Election, after a pandemic that would surely have been far better handled if the principles of communality and solidarity had been at the heart of government, Juliet Jacques presents a selection of films that mostly look back at socialist politics and culture. Starting with comrade John Smith's film made in response to the Covid-19 crisis, and the government's chaotic communications, these films - by Jasmina Cibic, Octavia Cortázar, the Duvet Brothers, Deimantas Narkevičius, Oleksiy Radynski, Kerry Tribe and others - engage creatively with ideology and art in Yugoslavia, the USSR, Cuba, the UK and beyond.
Juliet Jacques (b. 1981) is a writer and filmmaker, based in London. She has published two books, most recently Trans: A Memoir (Verso, 2015). Her short fiction, journalism and essays have appeared in numerous publications including The Guardian, Granta, Frieze, New York Times, Arts of the Working Class, London Review of Books and elsewhere. Her short films have screened in galleries and festivals worldwide. She has taught art and creative writing at the Royal College of Art and other institutions, and hosts the political arts podcast Suite (212).
Replay: 2 October May, 9AM BST
W/ Maryam Jafri / Maan Abu Taleb & Others
7 October, 9PM BST
Replay: 9 October, 9AM BST
BBZ TV: Past, Present and Future
14 October, 9PM BST
Replay: 16 October, 9AM BST
Ignota Books: Deep Deep Dream
Curated by Anne Duffau, Hana Noorali and Tai Shani
W/ Adam Christensen / Carolyn Lazard / Hardeep Pandhal / Imran Perretta / Jordan Lord / Sung Tieu / Tabita Rezaire / Lloyd Corporation / Isabel Waidner / Anaïs Duplan / Rehana Zaman & Others
Tony Cokes / Georgie Grace / TBC
Season 2 of TRANSMISSIONS will run as eight weekly episodes screening every Wednesday at 9 pm BST and repeated on Friday at 9 am BST on Twitch. The 1st episode will air on 9th of September 2020. Each artist included in TRANSMISSIONS is paid a fee in return for their contribution. In some instances, artists have waived their fees in order to donate the money to a charity of their choice. With a sense of community, all the money used to pay artists in season 2 has been kindly donated by established art institutions and commercially stable artists: BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Chisenhale Gallery, DACS, Grazer Kunstverein, Matt's Gallery, Studio Oscar Murillo, Somerset House Studios Wysing Arts Centre enb Netwerk Aalst.