Atomic Light

11 February 2023–6 May 2023 / John Hansard Gallery

Atomic Light featured four new films, Blandy’s most ambitious productions to date. The works build upon his continued interest in history, the legacy of empire and the climate crisis. Two films were shot on location in Singapore and the UK, the other two created using archive and found footage.

Atomic Light - was co-commissioned by John Hansard Gallery and Towner Eastbourne, with support from Arts Council England, Screen Archive South East and Elephant Trust.

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Installation view: Atomic Light - David Blandy, John Hansard Gallery, 2023. Images: Reece Straw

Atomic Light expanded on Blandy’s Artist Residency at Towner Gallery, Eastbourne in 2022. The exhibition included immersive installations and associated ephemera. In Sunspot, two observatories, one in California, one in Tokyo, both observe the same sun on the day an atomic sun was made on earth – the Hiroshima bomb that killed 100,000 people. In Soil, Sinew and Bone, using footage from Screen Archive South East, a history of war and a history of agriculture are mirrored, the fertile earth of phosphates and nitrates reflected into weapons of war.

All the tales are connected through the story of Blandy’s grandfather, a British soldier interned as a Japanese prisoner of war, who believed that the horrific atomic bombing of Hiroshima saved his life. The twinned films, The Edge of Forever and Empire of the Swamp feature the landscapes of southern England, his home, and Singapore, where he was held as a POW.

The English story is one of two children coming to terms with their familial history, how it is wrapped up with war and societal complicity with environmental destruction. The Singaporean script, written by playwright Joel Tan, is a fable of nature and the repercussions of colonialism. Both feature fragile ecosystems, with mangroves at risk, the sea polluted, the air poisoned. Both islands are not self-sustaining, relying on imported food and labour. Singapore is built on a graveyard, while England is haunted by ghosts of the past, ghosts of Empire.

Blandy also worked with participants from Ventnor Exchange Poetry Collective, Isle of Wight and No Limits, Southampton for a new text-based work that was used in tandem with video from new software, Astera Evolution projects; cosmological visualisation tools developed at the University of Southampton by Christopher Marsden, Tobias Grubenmann and Francesco Shankar, University of Southampton 2019-2022.

Atomic Light was co-commissioned by John Hansard Gallery and Towner Eastbourne, supported by Arts Council England, Screen Archive South East and The Elephant Trust.

Films

Atomic Light - David Blandy artist book, published by John Hansard Gallery, 2023
Available through the gallery bookshop

Studio International: Review by David Trigg
Creative Boom Interview: Fiona Keating
ROSA interview: Imogen Lycett Green

Alongside the exhibition, Blandy’s film Child of the Atom (2010) was shown on the Digital Array Screen. Pivotal in the development of his artistic practice, the film was the starting point for a series of works that have culminated in the exhibition.

Field trip to a Solar Observatory

Photo credit: Tim Martin from The Exchange Collective

Participants from The Exchange Collective, an Isle of Wight based Spoken-Word Poetry Collective from Ventnor Exchange were taken on a field trip to Clanfield Observatory, Hampshire for an incredible R&D day exploring the sun and all things Solar. This was a follow up to their collective writing workshops with David Blandy that culminated in a printed game The Lives of the Stars and a text based computer work.

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