Mike Stubbs – City Strapline Industries
City Strapline Industries is an installation combining processes of ‘social interference’ and media making that explores the phenomenon of the branding of cities as a strategy, not only of marketing, but also of regeneration.The exhibition will also feature other recent video works by the artist, including Cultural Quarter, 2003 (multiple–prize at the Echigo–Tsumari Art Triennial in Japan, August 2003).
By placing idiosyncratic and unsanctioned culture alongside efforts to market a location strategically, the works highlight the complexities and hierarchies involved. Straplines like ‘Sheffield – City on the Move’, ‘Bedfordshire – A Progressive County’ and ‘Bradford’s bouncing back’ serve as testaments to the universality of city marketing over recent decades, but also to the continuing inertia of social and economic realities that bears upon these aspirational, optimistic statements.
Mike Stubbs is a film–maker, artist and curator whose has often adopted a documentary style, creating poignant social observations in films such as Little England, Doughnut and Homing, many of which have been broadcast on C4 and the BBC.
Exhibitions
27 Mar – 30 Apr 04 | Baltic, Gateshead, UK
17 Apr – 22 May 04 | Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, UK
Produced by Forma
Supported by Newcastle Gateshead Initiative, New Media Scotland and University of Dundee
