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Esther Johnson

 

A Street Named Humber, 2004, betaSP, 16min.

I have continually valued the importance of archives and museums since visiting them as a child, as well as my work at the AHRB British Artists' Film and Video Study Collection. As an artist, you become aware of the ephemeral nature of materials and the lifespan of a work. By having the opportunity to have my own work archived in the correct conditions, it allows work to live on and be accessible for future study or curatorial purposes. As well as working within the 'moment' on new projects, it is also especially useful to have previous work preserved – after all we mostly learn where we have come from by looking at works from the past, whether in an historical context or within a personal and artistic context. By looking at the path I have trodden, I am able to see how my ideas and working methods of the present have been formed.

Nevertheless, not only is it crucial to be able to preserve work for personal reasons, it is also critical that a breadth of artistic output is kept for future generations. Such archives are vital in facilitating the longevity of work made on more unstable media. It is amazing and heartbreaking how many films from the beginning of cinema have been lost due to disintegration; for instance only a third of silent cinema is reported to survive today.

Films allow us to capture thoughts and visions and imprison them for everlasting inspection, just as archiving work is a chance to share this individual and collective history. I am particularly interested in working to cross the perceived parameters of what documentary can be, looking for the poetry and vernacular energy of the everyday. This crossover aims to discover the images–between–images in things not normally represented. I strive to create an 'extract' cinema through films ability to explore, rediscover and reassess the physical world around us and the vicissitudes of perception. By deciding what to omit from the outset I can clarify and find the crucial essence of what I am really trying to achieve, a film which resonates something that I cannot express in any other way.

Making films is a chance to frame visions, create poetry, resonate thoughts and observe closely through associations and abstractions; to create a dialogue through discipline with each film becoming a new learning experience.

The use of sound is also essential in order to create spaces of reflection, with silence being a powerful tool to enhance the possibilities the frame holds for looking. Quietly observing whilst giving room to observe. As Robert Bresson writes in his spectacular book Notes on Cinematography, "Build your film on white, on silence and on stillness".

A Street Named Humber, 2004, betaSP, 16min.

Since graduating from the Royal College of Art London, Esther has been working as a filmmaker, photographer and writer. Her work has appeared in film festivals, art galleries and publications in the UK and internationally. She has recently completed writing an essay as well as curating a web exhibition for the AHRB British Artists' Film and Video Study Collection at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, London, as well as essays for Dot Dot Dot magazine.

Current work includes commissions for the Site Gallery Sheffield, plus Arts Council of England and London-based projects as well as being the director of the Hull International Short Film Festival, which she first directed in July 2005. Esther will undertake a film makers residency at Werkleitz, Halle Germany in the near future.