If you have not had a chance to get with this big (coffee table) book – even if sometimes the aesthetic overrides the political – there is no better way to get your history and context. Among MANY MANY gems, the work of Reece Auguiste is luminous:
‘A general paralysis seems to govern the Left’s political imagination in the 80s, and that is particularly pronounced in the area of cultural production. Having said that, we must also acknowledge that the crisis of the British film industry predates the advent of Thatcherism. It appears that Thatcherite politics is merely hammering home the last few nails into the coffin. Those vital considerations aside, we still do not have a film policy on a national level that is capable of creating a vibrant and viable film and media industry; of promoting a film culture which has at its centre new and challenging visual productions, together with the necessary finances to ensure its continuation. A reformulated and viable film policy with central and local government providing capital investment would ensure full employment for film and video artists whose immense talent for the art of cinema often dies a horrendous death. Any national film policy, however, cannot afford to erase from its agenda the issues of race and representation; thus black independents have, with relentless persistence, to deliberate and ensure the inscription of race on any film policy agenda in Britain. In this cataclysmic field of multiple contradictions, of political and cultural uncertainties, which is partly determined by economic monetarism, where precisely are black independents located and how can we best arrest the tide?’ (Auguiste and Black Audio Film Collective. 1989/2007: 163)
Auguiste, Reece and Black Audio Film Collective. 1989/2007. Black Independents and Third Cinema: The British Context.’ In, Eshun, Kodwo and Anjelika Sagar (Eds), The Ghosts of Songs: The Film Art of the Black Audio Film Collective 1982-1998. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, pp. 162-167
(word to the wise guy – its on zed lib – but a digital version won’t have the same feel as the pleasures of handling this lush and fat landscape tome)
Trinketization 