The Past is Ongoing

Angela Darby and Robert Peters are interested in all sorts of mementos, memorabilia and souvenirs, large or small scale, hidden or plain open. Like cultural anthropologists they collect, photograph and archive signs of personal expression made public and expose a creativity which is commonly undervalued.
Darby /Peters’ practice offers an opportunity to reflect on the nature of the collaborative process. The two individuals have collaborated over a number of years in a range of media. The Past is Ongoing explores the nature of their joint practice in a manner that suggests both symbiosis and division. All images have been captured in urban settings and feature elements from previous projects.
Public Address presents an ongoing documentative process, recording non commodified rituals. For this exhibition, examples of these unsanctioned public interventions at one bridge are presented in a new configuration spanning the slippage of time.
Private Lives in Public Spaces is a series of new works that combine a meme in which padlocks emblazoned with lovers' names are attached to bridges with an investigation of bridges that are notorious suicide spots. The video works I ain’t no kinda hustler and the intangible are observed street scenes that infer the brain's need to layer meaning onto random experiences.

‘I ain’t no kinda hustler’.

This title is taken from a line spoken by Joe Buck as he tosses his clothes into a city trashcan. The scene from the movie ‘Midnight Cowboy’ (1969) directed by John Schlesinger marks an epiphany for the character as he moves from a grimy existence in New York City to Miami hoping that the change of climate will cure his dying friend Ritzo Ratso. The soundtrack is sampled from the original movie score by John Barry and it is played backwards. The two rubbish bags in this film echo the relationship of the film's protagonists, subject to harsh influences beyond their control. As externalised receptacles of the passing consumer's litter, the bags also seem to be humanized in a desperate attempt to escape their confinement. Each element takes that which is familiar and transforms it into the unfamiliar.
The image ‘I ain’t no kinda hustler’ was captured within an urban setting and is displayed in a manner that connects a documented street scene contained within the gallery outward to the public domain. The dual projection is sequentially manipulated to infer divergence of approach.

Alongside their visual practice Angela Darby is a critical writer for Aesthetica The Art & Culture Publication and WhiteHot Magazine (NYC).

Robert Peters was a founding director of Catalyst Arts and is presently the Director of Seacourt Print Workshop based at The Centre for Fine Art Printmaking in Bangor Co. Down.

Private Lives in Public Spaces

A Valentine's action

14 February 2013, 6pm, starts at PS²

Duration: One hour, free event

Destination: Weir Bridge

A Bridge is a structure which connects two places divided by and obstacle, like a river, a valley or a road. It floats more or less elegant in the air, off the solid ground, in-between, not here, not there. This serves of course as an obvious metaphor of passageways, of state of minds, politics and-of yearning lovers. You are here, I am there, let’s bridge the gap and? Kiss? Perhaps.

But this walk and action for Valentine Lovers enacts a ritual common in many cities: two people give testimony of their love by adding a lock to the railings of a bridge. With the initials of their names scribbled on the metal, with the turn of the key thrown in the water they confess eternal... Oh stop it. Or start it. Artists Angela Darby and Robert Peters lead the Valentine’s tour to a nearby bridge. Bring a partner (if you can, not provided) and a lock (if you can, yet provided)and express your Private Lives in Public Spaces.

To see how this action took off see