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Reply | Any other Adam Curtis fans?
at 22:42 18 Jun 2025
Oh, i didn't mean to imply that. I love documentary as a medium. But i also love artfilm as a medium (and have made some) and kind of also sit between worlds as i teach academic (documentorial, if you wish) writing but preach creative practice (artfilm) as some of my jobs.
TV documentary is fab, though i wish the discipline was as good as it was in the 1960s-90s, but artfilm is not documentary, and while the Venn overlaps they are different beasts with different intentions and methodoligies. And when Curtis does it on TV, it deliberately confuses that Venn even more.
I am here for it, though not loved all his work and found it treading water for the last few, but I am still a fan of documentary and it very much has a place.
And - as an artist, art critic, tutor, and sometimes maker - i do think (and hope) that art can say things as serious and meaningful as documentary, that also wasn't my intent. It is just a very different mode of communication, it isn't documentary, it isn't political lobbying, it isn't academic essay, it's not architectural research, it's not community engagement. Yet, it's often shorthanded into all these, and more, and sometimes appears to have lost power from the outside as it doesn't do any one of them perfectly well. But, yeah, I spend most of my week writing about how art can do these in its own way.
What comes next? I think we are seeing it with TikTok, Reels and the like. Not that I like all (most) of it, but it deals with archive, referencing, juxtaposition, montage, edit, and rhythm way better than Curtis can. Though it struggles with anything over 40 seconds... |
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Reply | Any other Adam Curtis fans?
at 16:26 18 Jun 2025
Well, one critique I've had of Curtis' work, and still do, is that the BBC entrust him and him alone to engage with the archive in this way. I would love to see it opened up every year to ten artists if different disciplines to engage in their own way. I like Curtis, but there are no surprises any more (in content or aesthetic) and as you say it becomes the Adam Curtis show where in other hands all kinds of ways of engaging with history, media, archive, politics, sound etc could be genuinely enlightening culturally. |
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Reply | Any other Adam Curtis fans?
at 15:41 18 Jun 2025
I think the issue with Curtis is, and it speaks to this point, is that because it's presented on TV and it uses archive footage it's presumed to be a documentary. It isn't, and therefore shouldn't really be held to the same criteria.
I've always considered him more akin to a visual artist, he uses methodologies and aesthetics used in contemporary art and the works would be very compatible in any modern art gallery setting, whether as a multi screen or single screen presentation. But he is presenting it on domestic screens where most people are used to reading such output as documentary, but it's really an art work I think.
On that point you make re the speech, she did make a speech of similar language to that used when she was ten points behind, I've read, and it did start the switch. That specific footage wasn't that speech, and this would matter if it was a documentary, but as a visual and sonic landscape that seeks to present mood, montage and have a narrative of aesthetic form more than academic, it works just fine for my critique as a cultural critic.
I've not liked all his work, but am half way through Shifty and I'm very on board - though this may possibly be just because he's exploring the landscapes I remember and we all still live in today, so it has a sense on nostalgia and personal interest in where previous offers haven't for me. [Post edited 18 Jun 15:43]
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Reply | Where were Town on your birthday?
at 12:40 17 Jun 2025
On that day I was born in 1980 Ipswich were top of Division 1 on goal difference, but with a game in hand over second placed Aston Villa, both of us on 18 points. |
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Reply | McKenna’s silence is deafening
at 10:35 9 Jun 2025
My goodness this meltdown over imaginaries is bizarre. How do people like you survive day to day with just normal life?
I think I will log off TWTD until August as it's just unusable with all this guff |
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Reply | New sponsor to be announced imminently!
at 13:02 5 Jun 2025
Adnams are a far more ethical company in relation to humans, nature and the brewing sector than Greene King. Plus GK tastes garbage. [Post edited 5 Jun 13:03]
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Reply | Undisclosed fee
at 21:47 4 Jun 2025
I presume that's a PSR thing too. To cover debt this accounting year but feed into the next one? [Post edited 4 Jun 21:52]
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Thread | Undisclosed fee
at 21:24 4 Jun 2025
Why would a transfer, especially one like this, be an "undisclosed fee"?
Everybody in the football and finance world knows what the cost is, it's hardly a secret, so what's the purpose of hiding it behind such a silly phrase?
I presume something to do with Chelsea's weird accounting? |
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Reply | Titz out...
at 12:30 25 May 2025
Rooney is 33:1 and I would find it absolutely hilarious. |
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Reply | Weekly MOTD moan.
at 10:46 4 May 2025
I don't dislike Lineker at all, and think he's a very good presenter. What I am extremely tired of is all the bants between ex players - not a thing can happen with a club they were once at, or with a records table they are on, without it becoming a little opportunity to talk about themselves and make jokes. It's tiresome. |
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Reply | Bradford
at 19:25 3 May 2025
I wonder why one of the fans pushed over and then taunted the ref. Weird way to celebrate. |
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Reply | Superb performance
at 18:41 3 May 2025
I think I went to a very different Fulham away game than you! |
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Reply | Ashton's spelling is atrocious...
at 16:24 1 May 2025
I am a professional writer, i publish something every day or two, and teach writing at universities. My text is littered with mistakes. Usually a good editor finds them, but i am pretty garbage at spotting them in self-published stories. |
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Reply | Does this Citeh fan have a valid point?
at 18:25 29 Apr 2025
I live in London. I don't pay this on food in a week. I don't get all this "London prices", things are only expensive in London if you go to very posh or best basic tourist places. |
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Reply | Just been listening to BM Podcast
at 18:21 28 Apr 2025
It really is. And it has secondary impact
For example, I'm director of an arts charity and we've struggled to get any media coverage in the UK.
We have a huge gallery in Wrexham, no UK arts media have mentioned it but Disney TV went to it and recorded there a few weeks ago to potentially include on the programme... |
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Site Scores| Forum Votes: | 379 | | Comment Votes: | 66 | | Prediction League: | 3 | | TOTAL: | 448 |
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