James Beckett

From Monoskop
Jump to navigation Jump to search

Born 1977, Harare, Zimbabwe. Graduated from the Technikon-Natal, Durban South Africa, after which he took part in a two-year residency in the Rijksakademie Van Beeldende Kunsten, Amsterdam. Coming from a background of installation, sound has come to develop a more central role in his work. This has been a research-based activity with output ranging from radio documentaries to mock ethnic bands, and museum displays documenting the cultural and physiological effects of noise. The evolution in specific areas of the industrial revolution have also played muse; such as the foundation of synthetic colour manufacture and its relationship to BASF, and the cultural implications of vacuum tubes for the Dutch firm Philips. Without humor his work would appear as mere cynism - it is romance with an inherently rotten subject matter which offers some sort of redemption in a modern world. Lives in Amsterdam.


http://www.jamesbeckett.tk