identiconarts

The Once & Future Britain from A. DEE on Vimeo.

The Once & Future Britain
The premise of this short shows us a Future Britain of 2024 where expressions of cultural diversity in the form of religious and cultural holidays have been banned. Difference has been near eradicated and cultural celebrations are now forbidden in favour of creating a more ‘passive’ and ‘socially cohesive’ nation in the name of ‘Peace’ or sedate universalism.

Could this be the Future? Time will tell, as Mankind seems destined to repeat the mistakes of his past…

This film was Created, Directed, Written and Produced by myself, A. Dee (The Artful Dodger) and Narrated by Felicity Finch.

This was a project I did at Iniva based over in Shoreditch, London at the end of last year.

Based on some of the Identicons Projects that I had done and my work with young people, I was asked to come and do a project at their downstairs gallery space.

The premise of the installation takes us to a Future Britain of 2024 where expressions of cultural diversity in the form of religious and cultural holidays have been banned. Difference has been near eradicated and cultural celebrations are now forbidden in favour of creating a more ‘passive’ and ‘socially cohesive’ nation in the name of ‘Peace’ or sedate universalism.

The group have come into contact with a section of wall art that has been retrieved from this future British society (much like what happened when the Berlin Wall came down) and assembled it in the present. Their window piece acts as a pre-emptive strike against a potential future establishment, and as a forboding monument to freedom of expression and warns of the dangers of its erosion.

This short film shows the project in progress from the beginning of December ’09 for the eventual window display/exhibit. I collaborated with about 5 other artists on it, and this shows the (almost) finished result. The project was a mixture of spray-paint, stencils, graphic design, acrylics and photography.

Thanks go out to; AKS USN, Iulia Filipovscaia, Remi Fedare, Sam Jenkins, The Artful Dodger, Tigz Rice, Felicity Finch, Sheena and a Big Thank You to Teresa Cisneros-Ledda.