»No one really knows London,« a voice says as a commentary to a sequence of blurred pictures. Some cuts later, the camera focuses the pictures slowly merging into one another, and the voice goes on with a narration about the South Bank in London. »Driftwood« is a half-hour long video by Nick Relph and Oliver Payne that was shown at Gavin Brown's Enterprise in New York in the autumn of this year.

»Driftwood« was made in 1999 and, together with »House & Garage« (2000) and »Jungle« (2001), forms a trilogy on the relationship between city, suburbs and the country. This trilogy was continuously projected in a side room of the gallery. Although »Driftwood« is the first work of these two English artists, and integrally linked to both the other videos, it is the most developed work and, as such, stands out dramatically from »House & Garage« and »Jungle.«

The story told in »Driftwood« and the moods it sets forth are about city usage, urban changes, and scenarios of capitalistic control. The first scenes show undefined urban spaces underneath the cultural institutions on London's South Bank, institutions that came into being as part of large-scale urban renewal projects in the fifties – and provoked criticism as icons of a »New Brutalism« even back then. The camera aims at the areas created under the actual structure – of which the Serpentine Gallery also forms a part – as sorts of remnants that have slipped away from the prestigious aspect of architecture. Since the seventies, skateboarders have made this urban »non-space« a center of activity, quite contrary to any plan; and it has remained so to this day, notwithstanding various attempts at reappropriation by the control mechanisms of the town planning apparatus. The continuous voice-over on the video complements the passing pictures of clefts in the pavement, of built-up obstacles, with a story of the conflict between civic organs of control and skateboarders. Structures designed as hindrances make for sporting challenges, watchmen are beaten up by the kids, and an exhibition for blind people is got rid of by simply burning it down.

The camera moves on and focuses on the barbs and sharp points that decorate buildings and public squares everywhere, determining, together with uncomfortable benches, bodily positions in the public space. The public (or, rather: a certain public) is thus deterred from lingering around. In between, the camera shows sculptures of bronze figures stretched out casually, their pedestals also surrounded by sharp points to prevent anyone sitting down.

Structurally, the video is divided up into several chapters: following the South Bank, there is a look at Canary Wharf, a showpiece of the Thatcherite developer mentality of the eighties in the docklands. The text quotes Le Corbusier's differentiation between the rational, modern »city of order« and the old, labyrinthine »city of the pack-asses,« and contrasts modern efficiency as formulated in »Vers un Architecture« with a phrase from Margaret Thatcher: »There is no such thing as society. There are only individual men and women – and then there are families.«

The leisurely tour goes on. The camera is now in front of one of the omnipresent youth culture megashops that have become the nightmare and, at the same time, the center, of the countermovements within youth culture. While looking at the hustle and bustle at the entrance of a Virgin/Nike/Sony/Doc Martin's shopping palace, the viewers hear about »repackaging«: how ideas become slogans for kids who never understood punk anyway: »You can get a lifestyle adjustment for 200 quid.« London's Soho – once a »territory for exiles and revolutionaries« – is described as a »gigantic Hard Rock Café.« Untiring, the camera next devotes itself to the new »digital lifestyle.« People with mobile telephones ping-pong with the homeless. Both groups speak with invisible people, both groups are involved »in a publicly audible dialogue with voices in their heads.«

In the following scene, the camera looks through the close-meshed grid of a bridge above some railway lines. A train loaded with cars approaches on the rails beneath.
While one freight car after the other moves into the center of the picture and then disappears under the bridge, the viewers hear about increasing mobility, about the relationship of public transport to the individual use of cars, and relationship of these to national resources: »While the costs for public transport are constantly rising, the prices for individual means of transport are sinking.« This scene, particularly successful in its simplicity and visual conciseness of meaning, ends when the last freight car disappears under the bridge.

A broad view of a construction site is then contrasted with flowers, run-down factory grounds alternate with pictures of corporate glass palaces. The voice now speaks directly to the viewers. »If desire is a physical possibility, then you have to resist the constricting stranglehold of the social order and act according to the desire.« A cut then takes us from a rusty piece of metal with »Rust never sleeps« written on it, over which a skateboarder is riding, to the final scene, in which a man in a suit is sitting on the ground, sleeping, with a bunch of flowers in his hand. Then a further cut to an old rubbish bin, on whose side someone has written »I love you« a long time ago.

The pictures in »Driftwood« are presented as static images, and flow smoothly into one another in a series of soft cuts. The camera always stands still; every movement that is seen is a movement in the city – there are no moving shots, no zooms, no pan shots, just a motionless camera on a tripod. The combination of the staticness of the apparatus with the smooth transitions produces an effective visual flow driven by the polished narration. The latter is provided by a voice that signalizes »working class,« and freely mixes documentary, historical precision with punk attitudes on the level of language and content. The voice seems to speak from various social and political positions at once, but without ever losing its critical impetus. The resulting dialogue is complex and banal, dogmatic and open, persuasive and gentle at one and the same time. The background is a soundtrack composed of string quartet, and lounge music that has been put through the meat grinder. It complements the narration, sometimes in the foreground, sometimes less so. The cuts are arranged rhythmically; wide-angle shots and close-ups, bright and dark scenes alternate with one another, as do impressionistic moods and the factual representation of unpleasant realities in the urban context.

Some reviewers see »Driftwood« as having been influenced by Dan Graham's »Rock My Religion«; Robert Smithson's films are also mentioned. But what seems to me to be a more cogent reference – particularly in a British context – are certain film productions made by the so-called Black British Film Collectives. As far as the subject of London and the formal method are concerned, I would particularly point to Isaac Julien's film »Territories« of 1984, which Julien made in the context of the Sankofa Collective. »Territories« presents a complex picture of London in a similarly impressionistic manner, from the point of view of young black people from the music scene. »Driftwood« also calls to mind »Twilight City« (1989) by Reece Auguste and the Black Audio Film Colective. »Twilight City« is determined by a nocturnal car ride through London, with an inner monologue freely combining private memories and urbanistic observations as commentary. Another reference point that comes to mind is works by Nils Norman, above all his publication »The Contemporary Picturesque,« in which there is a wealth of annotated photographs that concentrate on the same architectural obstacles as in the first part of »Driftwood.« Although this list of references could easily be extended, I do not mean to relativize, but to contextualize, placing »Driftwood« in a rich field of critical, reflective practices that analyze urban contexts in a stimulating manner.

»Driftwood« is an extremely successful, convincing portrait of London in the form of a documentary video. Its persuasive power comes above all from the simplicity of the means used. The formal, static camera position makes the city itself a protagonist: London is simultaneously the subject and object of a meandering archaeology, in images and words, of city, city planning and city utilization.

 

Translated by Tim Jones

 

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