Jerwood/FVU Awards 2019: Going, Gone

The Jerwood/FVU Awards 2019: Going, Gone premieres two newly commissioned moving-image installations by Webb-Ellis and Richard Whitby, the recipients of this sixth edition of the Awards.
Responding to the curatorial theme of Going, Gone, the two works act as a barometer of the uncertain present (and unclear future) of contemporary Britain in the lead-up to its declared exit from the EU next spring.

Filmed during the extraordinary long, hot summer of 2018, Webb-Ellis’ For The First Baby Born in Space,   features a number of teenagers from the artists’ home base of North Yorkshire and elsewhere. Talking to them about their hopes and aspirations and listening to them about their fears, it records how their coming of age coincides with a time when so much else is in flux.
Richard Whitby, The Lost Ones, follows a motley queue of individuals who are all seeking salvation. They are people in limbo – whose personal circumstances or economic situations have been suddenly re-evaluated and whose future status now seems conditional on a test that they need to pass.

The artists were selected from over 140 applications by Elizabeth Price, artist; Peter Taylor, Festival Director at Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival; Steven Bode, Director, Film and Video Umbrella; and Sarah Williams, Head of Visual Arts at Jerwood Arts.

The Jerwood/FVU Awards are a major annual opportunity for moving-image artists run in partnership by Jerwood Arts and FVU. They were established in 2012 in response to a need for significant major commissions for early-career moving-image artists at an unproven stage in their practice, and contribute to an ongoing dialogue around urgent or timely concerns within moving image through the curatorial theme which changes each year. Alumni include Ed Atkins, Corin Sworn, Emma Hart and Marianna Simnett.