'Escape'
Wimbledon Space 2015
Photo:- Nick Manser
Based on the plans of a 1930's homebuilt aeroplane design called the Flying Flea. 'Skyscape Escape' is made from tea chests and newspaper and powered by a 'Citreon 2cv' engine.
The designer, Henri Mignet, wrote a book on how to build the aeroplane that includes a chapter on how to fly it. This example is slightly modified as the original had a notorious design fault.
The designer, Henri Mignet, wrote a book on how to build the aeroplane that includes a chapter on how to fly it. This example is slightly modified as the original had a notorious design fault.
Although the wings were made from newspaper articles about other projects they also included articles about the plane itself. This one on the underside of the wing was from 1996 in the 'London Evening Standard'
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The newspapers used for the construction of the wings are all pages that somewhere include articles about other vehicles made by me.
Self promotion is a sometimes unaddressed issue of contemporary art. This aspect of 'Skyscape Escape' was a self conscious attempt to bring the artist's media image into the art gallery with the work. In the 1990’s, with the advent of the phenomenon of the ‘Young British Artist’, ‘artist’ as celebrity was more prominent than ever. Successful artists were 'well known' artists but I wanted to address the question, which came first? In a postmodern pluralist art world it was easy to be mistaken in thinking that the artists with the best media image were fêted as being the artists most lauded. My argument was that the ground for gauging the quality of art had shifted from the gallery into the media. In covering the wings of the plane with newspaper articles about myself I was attempting to bring that ground back into the gallery. |
'Wimbeldon Space' 2015. Photo: Nick Manser
Ultimately the ground shifted again anyway with the advent of the internet and social media making newspaper publicity a bit obsolete. In some ways however its also quite a timeless debate looking at the sociopathic nature of artists and success. (related article in the Guardian 2012)
'Royal College of Art' 1996
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'Skyscape Escape' was made on limited resources over a period of ten years. It was begun in 1994 and flew for the first time in 2003 (more modifications were carried out in 2004). It was shown for the first time in 1996 at the R.C.A. on the roof of a garden shed. On that occasion the wings were temporary structures covered with photo copies on newsprint that were aged with tea and coffee. These were glued together with wall paper paste.
The shed was eventually abandoned. Its function in the art piece was ultimately that of a plinth that alluded to the 'outsider' or even 'anti-art' position of the work. This became a flawed connotation as not only had Cornelia Parker made her piece 'Cold Dark Matter' four years earlier but a whole string of Y.B.A.s used sheds in their work over the next few years (Tracey Emin, Simon Starling, John Frankland, Tracey Emin). The ‘shed’ had become well and truly appropriated by the contemporary art world. Ironically, as an unknown artist, I couldn’t use it anymore without it looking derivative. Luckily the shed was conceptually expendable. |
The plane was displayed at an exhibition in Amsterdam in 2004. My invitation to be part of the show was a bit last minute and I went to Holland directly from the airfield. It was an ill conceived plan because at that time all my efforts had gone into trying to make the plane actually work. I hadn’t given enough consideration into rethinking how ‘Skyscape Escape’ was going to work in the context of an exhibition. I should have just said 'no' but I was wowed by the chance of being in an international show. Holland was a particularly bad choice at this time because a famous Dutch artist called Joost Conijn (who I didn’t really know much about at time) had just had a very well publicised film about himself made that told the story of how he also built and tried to fly a plane. His story documents his difficulties and disappointments which were similar to the ones I had experienced. However my experience had an extra layer of adversity that Conijn did not have to put up with. It was a 6 hour ferry ride to Holland for an outdoor show in one of the wettest Septembers on record. There’s very little archival evidence of this exhibition anywhere. The only thing I had to show for my efforts at the end was a plane full of water and a damming couple of lines in a Dutch national newspaper (De Volksrant) saying ‘compared to Joost Conijn’s this work is quite boring’. The fact that it was another newspaper article to stick on the aeroplane was an interesting if depressing irony.
In 2015 I was offered a solo exhibition at the gallery 'Wimbledon Space'. The piece was adapted for the exhibition by the addition of my crash helmet and goggles. Projected on each eye piece was a film of the plane in split screen.
The rudder was built slighty differently to the wings in that it was skinned with pages of 'Henri Mignet's' book that I had used to build the plane.
My favorite local newspaper article. 'Hull Daily Mail'., 2002. If I had a goal with the idea of making the wings from my own 'naff' media image this was it! In the article the journalist actually addresses the role that the media plays in trivialising art. At the time I had never seen a self critical article in a local newspaper before. I like to think the work held a mirror to populist press and casued this little 'short circuit' in the system just before the internet made it less relevant.
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As well as explaining how to build
the plane the book also had a handy brief chapter at the back on 'How to fly!'
The engine was from a Citroen 2 CV. It seemed an appropriate engine as its lineage was from the same pre war French era as the plane. I took a self consciously eccentric approach to the visual aspects of the engine. At the bottom you can see a white enamel cup that held the oil filter. On the top, the silver air filter was actually made from my mums aluminium teapot. To the left of this is an upside down milk bottle containing the drip feed oil supply for the the propellors chain drive.
My well thumbed original copy of Henri Mignet's 'Flying Flea' book.
The chapter on how to build the fuselage. It's one of the more straight forward processes. All written in a very easy going style; it reiminded of the Harry Enfield comedic charater 'Mr Cholmondley Warner'. Even the more complicated elements like the propellor and even 'How to Fly' are written in the same worryingly 'laissez-faire' manner.
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The part of the runway I was using had a bit of a hill and this was taken as I took off having climbed up it. My highest recorded 'hop'; it would have have kept going but unfortunately I had reached the limit of my abilities to pilot it. I hit the ground very hard seconds later in an effort to hastily land. (see earllier film) Photo:Jo Newman
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The film in the helmet included a section where the split screen synched up to show my eyes looking out of the goggles. The idea was at the limit of the capabilities of the projectors and unfortuantely one broke before the end of the show and proper documentation. It would be nice to do it again one day but with better kit.
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The Flying Flea design encouraged many inexperienced people to attempt to fly their own plane in the 1930's. This and a major aeronautical design flaw led to 13 fatalities and the the plane was soon banned. Part of the split screen film playing in the helmet had a sequence of historical still images of crashed Fleas and artistic representations of Icaraus. These images were alternately 'jump cut' between the left and right eye pieces of the goggles in time to the music 'Wagner's' 'Ride of the Valkyries.'
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All the historical Flea images were reproduced from the book 'Henri Mignet and His Flying Fleas' by Ken Ellis and the Icarus Images are as follows. 'Icarus and Daedalus' by Frederic Leighton; 'The Fall Of Icarus' by Carlo Saraceni; 'The Sun, or the Fall of Icarus' by Merry-Joseph Blondel; 'The Fall of Icarus', French circa 1660.
(Film 4 mins' 35 secs.) . I used some of this Super 8 footage in the 'helmet split screen film' but this edit was made primarily as the penaltimate film in the perfromance lecture 'Landscape, Seascape, Skyscape, Escape'. In the context of the lecture I don't let on that the plane actually flys only that it is potentially lethal. Consequently the long build up increases the tension in the auidience to the point where they usually clap, cheer or gasp spontaneously.as it finally lumbers into the air. Music: 'Wagner' ,'Ride of the Valkyries'.
For 'Sketch for Aeroplane Series' click on the image below
