Member Article

Great North Run Cultural Programme Hit the Ground

This group show presents work by internationally renowned artists on the theme of running and what running means to all kinds of people, from highly-trained athletes to enthusiastic amateurs to first-time participants. Hit The Ground examines running as a physical and mental experience, as a struggle and as an inspiration, as fun and as a regimen, requiring hard work and discipline.

Vicki Bennett?s playful new work Parade, made using 28 years of archive footage from the Bupa Great North Run, contrasts with Roderick Buchanan?s Harriers - intense video portraits of athletes in the moments immediately after a run. susan pui san lok has taken a different approach to archive material with footage from the Olympics forming the base of an ambitious five screen installation faster higher which explores the rigour, commitment and discipline of athletes, as well as the pomp and circumstance that surrounds major sporting events. The experience of running is further explored by two new pieces of work that have directly involved runners: Dry Run by NAME and Atau Tanaka of Culture Lab provides a high-tech interactive experience which tracks the physical and emotional journeys of ten people taking part in the Bupa Great North Run the first time; and The Streets Do Flow by Amy Feneck and Laura Mansfield, which offers a hand-made personal perspective on running, training and navigating a city.

Vicki Bennett Parade
The huge crowds of spectators and iconic vistas along the route of the Bupa Great North Run are given centre stage in Vicki Bennett?s new film Parade, an animated collage of archive footage from the last 28 years of the event. Creating a moving image montage of shirting perspectives and irregular angles the footage bursts out of the conventional TV format and reveals to the audience a unique panoramic view of the run. Referencing the Cubist and Futurist influence within the work, the film is accompanied by a playful recording of Erik Satie?s Parade by the Willem Breuker Kollektief, providing a reflection of the excitement that surrounds the run itself.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .