VJing and the art of vile jelly

What does Tony Blair’s New Labour and Peter Greenaway’s The Tulse Luper Suitcases have in common? Answer: both would like to be seen as the new Enlightenment. This morning in Hackney, that borough a lot of London denizens find hard to get to, Hackney anybody?, New Labour unveiled its Public Services Policy review with all the cabinet’s big guns on stage.

Push for 'personalised' services

Blair kept repeating that it’s all too easy to “focus on the negative”. Well, before moving onto Blair and Greenaway, let me recap a few experiences. The review is not about transport but the same criteria for reform applies. Personalising service, choice, focussed on people at the receiving end etc etc. My experiences of travelling to Hackney on the Silverlink overground train on time and unstressed have not been good, to say the least. I vividly remember, from some years ago, waiting the best part of an hour for a train, late into the snowy winter night. (No waiting room open- other stations often close them too to avoid vandalism I guess.) I hear things haven’t improved much.

THE UNBEARABLE DAILY NEWS
Dispatches: Britain’s Commuter Nightmare

On Saturday, around 19.00h, I was trying to board a Piccadilly line train homeward bound. All packed, the platform overcrowded and on a night with a sporting event and St.Patrick’s Day celebrations. Minor delays for some reason, but at this time of night on a Saturday it has always seemed the case in my experience. Does anyone put 2 + 2 together? We are at “the foothills of major educational advance,” said Chancellor Gordon Brown this morning. Certainly true of many quarters of the transport delivery sector. The Tubes are crap today too.

“Radicalise education in our classrooms,” was another of this morning’s New Labour quotes. After ground-breaking films, Greenaway had to decamp to Europe to find funding for his projects where he’s stayed ever since. I was met with the same disinterest, on my return, after working with Lars von Trier in Denmark.

The Times Online UK. Business Editor James Harding on why London is the new capital of the world London calling
It’s cool, classy, cosmopolitan — and it should secede from the UK. Business Editor James Harding on why London is the new capital of the world.


“New York defines the metropolitan, London the cosmopolitan” Cosmos meaning people from all parts of the world. Well, that’s certainly become truer than ever over the last 5 years. “And the reason for this is that foreigners in New York are, always, just that,” Harding goes on to say. But I never felt that. I always felt welcome in New York and for that matter every other American city I’ve visited over the last 20 years. The trouble with England and London, in particular, is that there are so many people trying so hard to show how liberal, democratic and humane they are: please keep quiet, ‘things will get better’ mentality. People should be thinking for themselves. I’m afraid I don’t see this New Enlightenment but I wish well those in Blair’s government that do really want to make a difference. I don’t wish to focus on the negative either Prime Minister Blair, but that’s the daily experience inflicted on my eyes. And as I don’t have any kids I shan’t dare comment on education. But after doing without a single NHS (National Health Service) visit in 10 years, I was viewed on my first encounter as a bludger. So much for self-reliance.

And further down the Times Online page: The New Yorker in London Erica Wagner ‘NY is cheaper and more convenient’ but London never ceases to fascinate me, perhaps because I know that I’ll always be a stranger here. But maybe everyone is a stranger in London; only London truly knows itself.”

“London is absurdly expensive. New Yorkers point out that the cost of living in their city is nearly half what it is here. Yet Charles Alexander, who is in charge of the UK operations of General Electric, America’s biggest company, says of his American colleagues in London: “They don’t want to leave.” They like the life, the schools, the style of the city.”

Bob Wigley, who runs Merrill Lynch in London, was at the meeting. His chief concern, he says, is complacency. London needs to worry about its transport infrastructure (in particular the long-stalled construction of Crossrail); it needs to be vigilant about its tax regime and defend its system of regulation. But, more than that, Wigley gives warning that “London needs to look east, towards the competition coming from Dubai, Singapore, Hong Kong”.

Tulse Luper is the life in 92 suitcases (92 being the atomic number of uranium) from 1921 to 1989 of Henry Purcell Tulse Luper, a writer, traveller, archivist and professional prisoner. “You have a loose tongue!” “No,” retorts Luper, “it’s firmly anchored to my best interests.” “There is no such thing as history only historians,” says the film. “Most games end in a draw.” The film is in 3 parts (DVD’s) and the Luper Network Site was under construction for 1001 days like Scheherazade. If it’s the last thing you do before throwing off your mortal coil, SEE IT. There’s plenty to read about it on the web and the best grapple with New Enlightenment concepts you’ll ever likely to see.
London Time Out Greenaway interview
Video interview with Peter Greenaway (May 2006)

Time Out London Optronica

While still in newspaper tabloid recommendation mode, another must see site is Centre for Visual Music

Yesterday’s National Film Theatre lecture by Cindy Keefer Projected Light and Color: Early Visual Music Color Organs and Light Shows showed just how devant-garde always was the avant-garde with powerbook sound and light shows dating back to 1734! There are a couple of DVD’s available too including the work of Oskar Fischinger At last! Fischinger on DVD! Keefer claims was the first VJ (Video disc jockey). What a fantastic Sunday afternoon.

And you need to listen to this: BBC Radio 3 Nightwaves

Seems as good a time as any to mention this: Hacking Democracy opens at London's ICA April 20. If they can get away with it they most certainly will!