Interview with Huw Andrews

Ultimate Blind Date
2010
(SD Video, 1 min 54 secs)

Grandstand
2010
(SD Video, 3 mins 39 secs)

Me: I recently saw your video You’ve Been Framed (2010) from the series Please Don’t Make

Me… (2010), on Slice arts show reel, Parkinson steps Leeds University Light Night 2010.

When I saw the video, I was with a few friends that had an obligation to stay with me, as I was

there to document mine and a friends works which where also on the show reel. What really

drew me to your film, was the reaction it seemed to provoke in my friends, it drew them out

of the lull of disinterest and seemed to connect with them on a level that the other films didn’t.

What led you to using

the Stig in such a way?

You've Been Framed
2010
(SD Video, 1 min 26 secs)

Huw: I wanted to put the Stig through multiple challenges, sharing and ridiculing my self-imposed

ban on the TV show Top Gear. I started the ban because it and its presenters seemed to be

everywhere, like a plague or something. In response, I left a post-it note on the flat shared

TV which said, “Please don’t make me watch Top Gear anymore.” I also instinctively drew

a hangman’s noose next to the words. I think I was trying to offset pettiness with oddity.

Unintentionally, the note provided enough entertainment to rival Top Gear and months

later received a public outing at 2 Beechwood Avenue’s Salon show. I was invited by the

Umbrella One-Offs curators (www.umbrellaoneoffs.co.uk) to use Umbrella for their first One-

Off. I wanted to produce a series of works based on the note. It would be a challenge in

itself, as I had five days to make and install everything from scratch (www.huwandrews.com/

pleasedontmakeme.html). Months earlier, I received a Stig stress toy as a gift. I wanted to

see what would happen when driving over him, putting him through a washing cycle and

mixing him with standard You Tube clips.

Me: You seem to have an interesting relationship with television, how would you say that this

impacts your practice?

Huw: It does impact, but only when I refer directly to television. Not all my works do so, as I don’t

consistently follow a single theme or medium. In this instance, references to television

were inescapable, due to the notoriety of Top Gear. Regardless of project, I loosely aim to

celebrate the undervalued and trivialise the valued, aiming to balance their places in society.

I find talent, reality and magazine programming extremely concerning, as they frequently

encourage us to worship manufactured individuals and shiny objects. Once completing the

videos, I realised they may reflect television’s attitude towards British masculinity. If I don’t

empathise with Top Gear’s lauding of gadgets, flowery shirts and ‘witty’ xenophobia, does

that make me less of a British male? Fortunately, there are some truly innovative, thoughtful

and genuine comedy, documentary and natural history programmes broadcasted, so I

definitely don’t see it as a wholly negative medium, just one to approach with care.

Me: What drew you to start experimenting with video as an output?

Huw: Complete chance, although I’m sure it would have happened anyway. I started experimenting

with appropriated footage, specifically a consumer programme I was interviewed for at

home in Wales. Virgin Atlantic had lost my bag for 28 days and turning to The Ferret was

the only way to force the appropriate compensation. I hated the sound of my own voice

and my inexplicable use of the word ‘and’ five or six times in one sentence. To maintain a

resemblance of sanity whilst editing, to mock my television appearance and to highlight the

fragmentation of time, I chopped up the footage and reorganised it into lists. It opened with

each breath in chronological order and continued with a few other collections. As my editing

improved I started recording my own video, I find it more fulfilling.

Me: I know that currently you are using a number of different mediums within your work, with

one of them being video. It would be interesting to try and understand how video seems to

coincide with the other mediums, and how it currently has an impact on your overall practice ?

Huw: Video art seems to have a higher tendency to become easily inaccessible and self indulgent

than non time-based media. When recording video, I try to shoot in the interest of the subject

and edit in the interest of the footage; hoping to guide rather than force an outcome. Video

commands the viewer, there is a start, end and its experienced face on. It is dictatorial. With

sculpture, the viewer generally chooses the duration and positions they use to experience it.

I feel video should at least value and engage the viewer’s thoughts, as it’s more demanding;

requiring a fixed period of time, concentration and plenty of surrounding space. As with

television, I hope to treat video with care. I try not to look for coincidences with other

mediums, just for mediums to complement each other where possible, why I generally resolve

a project with a series of works. So far, I have avoided video installation. If a video is strong

enough, then it should be able to stand alone.

Me: A number of your videos are very funny, do you see there to be a role for humor in art/

video art ?

Huw: There is definitely a role for humour in an artwork, as long as it’s a genuine rather than a

forced outcome. Drawing an emotional response from the viewer, is the sign of a relationship

forming, a communication exchange. I find a good piece of work lingers well after you’ve

left it. I find some reductive or predictable work too cold to find a connection with. Humour,

if present, is purely a by-product, as I set out to explore a thought or moment I have actually

experienced or witnessed. Something lived is more genuine and therefore more emotive

in content than something purely researched. I’m glad that humour can appear within art,

although its not essential, emotion is. Since finishing Please Don’t Make Me… (2010) I was

concerned that the use of the Stig could be gratuitous, attention seeking and an easy laugh,

so that particular show is also banned from my future work. I have to go, as my brother has

just flicked onto Dave and guess which programme is on? A clear sign for me to finish typing.