Here is Elsewhere is an essay film that explores the idea that in lockdown people become ‘nomads of the imagination’, forced to travel in their mind at a time when physical movement is heavily restricted. The film brings together images, archive film and contributions from other artists, writers and thinkers to ask whether these transformations in perception will enable us to live differently in the future.
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Watch Here is Elsewhere
Here is Elsewhere is a new work in two parts by artist-filmmaker Sarah Wood, that was commissioned by Kettle’s Yard during lockdown. The two parts work in dialogue – Here is Elsewhere is an essay film that weaves together a range of archive footage to explore the ways in which our minds, during a period of unprecedented isolation, might be adjusting in order to make sense of the constraints and restrictions to movement that have been placed on society. The film suggests that we have become ‘nomads of the imagination’; our minds reaching out to other people and places while we are apart.
Presented on a screen alongside Here is Elsewhere, The Unmade Film is an imagined proposition for an evolving film script written by Wood with contributions from other filmmakers and writers including Luke Fowler, Lucy Harris, Olivia Laing, Judy Price, Ali Smith and Andrea Luka Zimmerman. In a film which leaves image to the imagination, Wood asserts the importance of creativity and collaboration in a time of uncertainty and isolation and explores how others were imagining the wider world during lockdown.
You can download a transcript for The Unmade Film here.
Together the two parts invite the viewer to pause, take stock, and to imagine the possibilities for a future vision of the world.
Duration:
Here is Elsewhere, 11 minutes and 8 seconds
The Unmade Film, 14 minutes and 3 seconds
This film commission was made possible through the generous support of Sabine Jaccaud, Carol Atack & Alex van Someren, and Porthmeor Fund.
North South East West
To accompany Here is Elsewhere, we invited independent film curator and writer Gareth Evans to speak to Wood to find out more.
North South East West is a recording of their conversation which is accompanied by film footage taken near to where they each live in London and Cambridge. They discuss Wood’s thinking behind the new film, as well as art and place in the age of Covid, and the reimagining of our shared world.
North South East West lasts 20 minutes.
Correspondence
Following the Here is Elsewhere commission, Wood has made a short film that brings together archive footage and imagery taken around the Cornish coastline to reflect on issues of care and responsibility in art, curating, and making art during lockdown. The scripted voiceover in Correspondence takes the form of a letter written by Wood to her fellow artist Alfred Wallis.
Correspondence lasts 7 minutes and 30 seconds.
