Exhibition: 19 October – 24 November 2013

Preview: Friday 18 October 2013 6:30-8:30PM

A solo exhibition consisting of a single video streamed online on a computer workstation installed in the gallery. Potpourri, the title of this seven-minute video, is constructed from faux paparazzi footage interspliced with domestic scenes shot in high definition. The resulting edit is driven by a single narrative text delivered by alternate male and female voices with dislocated English accents. The film’s central script is collaged from a variety of sources which connect various stages of Keil’s personal examination of the fundamental gender oppositions (male camera towards female body) that inform vast amounts of contemporary image making in fashion, porn, social media, and celebrity gossip coverage.

Some of the most cogent material in the film is taken from conversations with a female participant in a user-driven pornographic social media platform. This online environment proposed an empowering and self-labelled ‘alternative’ possibility of women making their own images on their own terms, without conventional rules or regulations with regards to body type or personal style. The film’s narrative consistently appears to reject the idea that any kind of freedom can be achieved through self-sexualisation. Parts of the model’s interview are interwoven with the words of N-Dubz singer Tulisa’s “set the record straight” Youtube video, a self-uploaded response to a leaked sex tape. The narrative voice traverses through many more textual records – instagram comments, porn user feedback, transcriptions of private social interactions – providing an essayistic structure in which the singular voice of the video is embodied by material both primary and plundered.

The workstation recreates the individual viewing experience of home internet use and the one-to-one consumption of images. Potpourri is available to view online at http://potpourri.netne.net.

 

Morag Keil’s past solo exhibitions include ‘Palais de Token’, Neue Alte Bruecke, Frankfurt (2013); ‘Civil War’, Outpost, Norwich (2012); ‘Virginia Ham’, NAK, Aachen; ‘Moarg Kiel’, Palais de Tokyo, Paris; ‘Public Hanging’, Focal Point Gallery, Southend-on-Sea (all 2011). Keil received the Prix Lafayette in 2010.

This exhibition is supported by Arts Council England, Outset Contemporary Art Fund and The Elephant Trust.