Dreams of Safety - an experimental video series

Conference presentation introducing my online video series 'Dreams of Safety'.

In 2020, Nicholas Spice wrote that 'Covid 19 has broken out of the ghetto, that place where other people die [...] if the capitalist system is to survive, we shall need to go back to our dream of safety, and fast'. What are these ‘dreams of safety’, to which some of us would return, to slumber again? Who is the ‘we’ that the author refers to here?

During the first lockdown I had a recurring fantasy: being on a long-haul flight. This is a fantasy of restriction, of disempowerment, of privilege and inaction. What ideas of safety might others have? If we are going to embrace a new reality, as the climate crisis dictates, we must grasp what the old safety was like, even if it was only an illusion.

‘Dreams of Safety’ is a new series of videos using animation, video, music and recorded interviews to think these things through. So far I have interviewed a flight attendant based in East Asia and a former employee of Madame Tussauds, Delhi, India, and used their words to build an audio visual context for our conversations.

Coming from a background in experimental filmmaking, this project also draws on podcasting practices. The intention is for this to grow over time, through speaking to people with vastly different experiences of the Covid 19 pandemic but also other breaks in day-to-day realities.

My video and performance involve improvisation and collaboration, with the techniques of filmmaker Peter Watkins as a major influence. I work with tension, humour, awkwardness and pathos coming from vulnerabilities visible within the work. I often work with participants to visualise a hypothetical space or environment, using acting, digital models and DIY props. I am now looking for modes of production that allow a greater range of experiences to be present within the work, without travel and large budgets – and for a mode of online dissemination that makes sense for mode of working.

• https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvlCLLg...