4D Analysis

John Akomfrah - Vertigo Sea

John Akomfrah is an English film and artist director who investigates history, memory and personal identity within his work. He created a three-screen film named Vertigo Sea which has just recently been exhibited in Bristol. It was first seen as a part of Okwui Enwezor's All the Worlds Futures exhibition at the 56the Venice Biennale. The exhibition is based on man’s connection with the sea and it explores the roles of people within slavery, migration as well as conflict. The work highlights a lot of touching, explicit subjects which can be quite deep about cruelty within our race, greed and horror. There are clips in this film of historical figures experiencing the very cruel lives of Christians, Muslims and Jews being driven out of their countries, being killed, persecuted simply for their beliefs. The project hits many major historical problems in such a touching way it's hard to understand it all. The stills include people in various tricky situations including some with dead bodies. Costume is quite a big thing in his images as it tells you exactly who they are and what they're going through when in certain situation settings.

The image to the left is a good example of a person in tricky situation, this woman is being shadowed by a dark figure. She is portrayed to be an African woman being segregated for her nationality. This piece is one of my favourites as it moves me in such an emotional way. You can see her feelings and emotions on her face; she sort of looks fed up of everything as where she comes from is defining her life but at the same time she looks relieved and peaceful - like she’s in a peaceful field taking in the fresh air. The costume in this piece backs up the slavery act within migrants and foreign citizens.

Below is a 3 minute snippet from the exhibition. It shows the layout and the way his exhibition was presented.

A Plastic Ocean - Documentary Film

Plastic pollution has been evolved into a bigger problem than it ever has been over the past 30 years. We don't seem to care if we harm the ocean and what lives within it as long as we don't get the brunt end of it. Plastic Pollution Coalition is a global group of individuals, businesses and organizations who are trying to detox and make our oceans free from plastic. They're trying to improve the view of our coastline as well as help the health and wellbeing of animals/human life. PPC have brought together a group of scientists and leading filmmakers to produce 'A Plastic Ocean' - a movie documentary about a journalist name Craig Leeson who is searching for a blue whale but discovers a plastic ocean. He teams up with divers, researchers and scientists in this documentary which was shot over 4 years in 20 locations across the planet. It captures the harsh reality of plastic pollution, what it does to ocean life and ultimately human life. The aim of this project was for them to give people knowledge and guidance in what they can do to stop such tragedies from happening.

"We've treated the ocean as a place to throw things—dispose of things—that we did not want close to where we thought we lived. Actually, the whole planet is where we live."

—Dr. Sylvia Earle, ocean scientist, PPC Scientific Advisory Board member

Information and imagery taken from:

http://www.plasticpollutioncoalition.org/pft/2016/1/25/on-location-in-a-plastic-ocean