Decay Behind a Glass Monitor: The Prophetic Deterioration of Early Video Art

Shemilt, Emile

Abstract

Rewind: Artists’ video in the 70s and 80s derives from a four-year research project into the history of an art form that has become the hallmark of contemporary art. Based on an archive of interviews, ephemera and archive copies of tapes and installations from the pioneering period of British video art, this anthology brings together some of the leading scholars in the field, backed by an expert panel, to lay the groundwork for a history of the people, activities, institutions and interventions that made of video art the one true avant-garde in the United Kingdom in the 20th century.

Rewind is the founding text for the history of British video art; draws on a unique archive of oral history and personal experience; and opens up the archive for contemporary artists, curators, media historians and archivists.

The primary audience for the book lies in art history. Secondary areas include the growing field of media art history, archiving and conservation, media history and film and media studies. It will have a market among the increasing number of gallery visitors, many of them practicing artists, who have been introduced to the field of early video art by the Rewind project and connected projects, including the Future Histories of the Moving Image Network. There is international interest through the global Media Art History and Leonardo/ISAST groups and the many parallel research projects underway in fifteen or more countries worldwide.

Chapters from Sean Cubitt, Grahame Weinbren, Yvonne Spielmann, Malcolm Dickson, Stephen Partridge, Adam Lockhart, Jackie Hatfield and Emile Shemilt, with foreword by Brian Winston

Citation

Shemilt, E. (2012). Decay Behind a Glass Monitor: The Prophetic Deterioration of Early Video Art. In Rewind: British Artists’ Video in the 1970s & 1980s (91-105). John Libbey Publishing

• Publication Date: 2012
• Deposit Date: Jan 27, 2025
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Pages: 91-105
• Book Title: Rewind: British Artists’ Video in the 1970s & 1980s
• ISBN: 9780861967063
• Keywords: video art; art history; contemporary; moving image; media history; film studies; media studies