Goldsmiths - University of London

Steve Klee

My project is an attempt to understand and consequently address the ways in which power is distributed within art, particularly artists’ film & video. I am dissatisfied with the current interpretive frameworks most often applied to artists’ film & video. As I see it these views – held by both artists and theorists - fail to adequately describe the structural role ‘art’ occupies within broader culture, which is essential to understanding issues of culture and power. The consequence of this failure is the persistent abstraction, (and implicit valorisation) of the category art from other culture. An example of this process is that artists’ film & video is often conceived as neutral or objective terrain from which to criticise the products of the ‘culture industry’.

My research began with the attempt to theorise art’s ‘structural role’ by developing a description of the relationship between high and low culture in terms borrowed from the political philosophy of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. I argued that rivalry (antagonism) between ‘high’ and ‘low’ was a structural necessity for the existence of cultures per-se. Art could therefore be shown to be implicated,differentto mass culture but determined by the same logic, the same sorts of power relations.

I believed (and still believe) Artists’ film & video to be a particularly useful site to analyse this rivalry because the technologies used in its production have such a strong historical affiliation with mass culture. As a result ‘high’ and ‘low’ collide in artists’ film & video, its aesthetic forms and modes of address bearing the marks of numerous historical confrontations with its popular ‘others’. I want to develop a theoretical perspective that views these strategies of ‘management’ or ‘containment’ as part of a (hegemonic) process, which attempts to maintain the current hierarchical arrangement of culture.

Although I am still interested in the same problematic, that of art and power, my reference points have altered. I have moved away from the work of Laclau and Mouffe and am primarily concentrating on the writing of Jacques Ranciere. Currently my research consists in mapping his terminology of ‘police’ and ‘politics’ onto the contemporary art situation, again with specific attention to artists’ film and video.

Academic qualifications

2005 – Continuing: PhD Visual Art; Goldsmiths College
2000 – 2001: MA Fine Art (Distinction); Chelsea College of Art & Design.
1995 – 06. 1999: BA Hons Fine Art (First Class); Newcastle University.

Presentations and exhibitions

2006: POLLUTANT, solo show at Negative gallery.
2006: FROZEN TEARS III, a bookwork curated by John Russell.
2006: ITCHY PARK, a night of performance and video curated by Emily Wardill
2006: CENTREFOLD, a group show at E:VENT gallery.

Curatorial Projects

2004: MOTES IN ALL EYES, The Ship, London.
2003: RAM LOUNGE, The Ship, London.
2002: FILM and VIDEO SCREENING, former Army Medical College, Millbank, London.

Papers presented

2006: RESEARCH QUESTIONS, first respondent to Jacques Rancière, Goldsmiths College.
2003: WE MAKE OUR OWN, Tablet Gallery, London. Presented text

Research interests

2006: CENTREFOLD, Zoo art fair, London
2006: ET TU TRIBUTE, an evening of performance and video art, The Embassy, Edinburgh
2005: THE LOUNGE, South London Gallery, London
2004: MOTES IN ALL EYES, The Ship, London
2004: PRINCIPLE OF HOPE, Three Colts Gallery, London.
2003: RAM LOUNGE, The Ship, London.
2003: ON ALL BRITISH BREATH, Edric Audio – Visual, Midland Crowne Plaza, Manchester
2003: BABAK GHAZI CURATES THE FRIDGE, Magnifitat and Sons, Bruntsfield Avenue, Edinburgh.
2002: ABOUT THERE (LANDMARKHEIGHTS), former Army Medical College, Millbank, London.
2002: HISTORY LESSON, former Army Medical College, Millbank, London.
2001: CHELSEA MA EXHIBITION, Chelsea College of Art and Design.
2001: BARRIER METHOD, The House, Chelsea College of Art and Design.
2001: SLEEP OVER, The House, Chelsea College of Art and Design.
2001: CLOSED, 641 Fulham Rd, London.
2000: GOETHE’S OAK HAS WOODWORM, Curated by Duncan Hamilton, Static Gallery,Liverpool

Selected publications

2006: NOT – YET, magazine, edited by Babak Ghazi, appropriated text
2005: NOT – YET, magazine, edited by Babak Ghazi, facsimile film poster
2004: THE FUTURE MAGAZINE, edited by JJ Charlesworth, two reviews
2004: NOT – YET, Magazine, edited by Babak Ghazi, a narrative text
2002: METRONOME 8A THE STUNT and METRONOME 8B THE QUEEL, edited by Clemintine Deliss, Two narrative texts.