A note on: Facial animations and the closing event of A History of Unnecessary Developments

A third and final restricted event for Tereza Stehlikova and I’s exhibition at Willesden Gallery, this was another grand one, curated ably by Tereza. These events, with a max of 7 people, create something obviously intimate but also beyond that, removing expectation of audience, something palpably focused and playful and relaxed. This night we had powerful poetry readings by Cristina Viti and Stephen Watts, alongside talks by Jo Gibbons, my old friend and an incredible landscape architect, as well as animation performances and more. For my own part I read again, for the second time ever, from my CAR GIANT pamphlet that I had written for Tereza and I’s film, which is the centrepiece of this exhibition. http://www.stevenjfowler.com/developments

I also, unexpectedly, and gladly (after spending the event filming with two cameras, for my youtube and tereza’s instagram live) got to collaborate with the animator and artist Birgitta Hosea. http://www.birgittahosea.co.uk/ Birgitta was projected neon asemic poems and lines and drawings upon my own asemic poems! A quite brilliant performance, and she allowed me, or urged me, to get in there, in the way, to be painted upon. At first I wrote on my works and then I just stood there, like a dummy, in the best role a collaborator can have, while she drew upon my visage. It was cool to see on video afterward.

Though the exhibition runs for another week, it was this event that cemented Tereza and I’s feeling that the whole endeavour, run without much footfall as the lockdown trace remains, was wholly worthwhile.