Adam James

The Mudhead Dance - Concept and plans

2012-01-27T06:18:00.000-08:00

Here is a sample of some of the goings on behind my upcoming summer 2012 project at V22 as part of the Summer Club, entitled The Mudhead Dance. Stay tuned for costumes, guerrilla performance stills and more!

Live Poster Workshop Northampton University

2012-01-27T03:30:00.000-08:00

This little gem was the result of a one day workshop with the fine Art dept at Stoke on Trent University.

New studio V22 - Biscuit Factory

2011-08-01T13:51:00.000-07:00

Its been far too long since I put anything on here, but new studio new motivation. Well, I say new... I have been here since January. Anyway, these are some studio shots of some new shamanic tramp costumes I am making for a new project currently titled 'The Mudhead Dance'.

More to follow soon....

Even in death Hug is in trouble with the law

2009-12-11T06:17:00.000-08:00

This is taken from the front page of The Art Newspaper yesterday. I could not believe my eyes when I read it, so I immediately called the gallery to check the story out...... yes it was true. Best press ever.

There were (ever so slightly) red faces all round earlier this week at the non-profit John Jones Project Space in North London when police were called to investigate a possible break-in at the gallery. On discovering a deathly white, scarily stiff body at the far end of the room, the key holding company understandably alerted the boys in blue. Project Space managers were even called with the macabre news that a corpse had been found coiled up in the corner. But fear not—the police later telephoned to say that the dead man was, in fact, not really a man after all. The grisly find turned out to be a striking sculptural piece by RCA graduate Adam James which forms part of the current "Manderley" exhibition (one word: phew).

Gareth Harris - Deputy Editor of the Art Newspaper

http://www.theartnewspaper.com/in-the-frame/

LIVE POSTER workshop Kingston University

2009-03-06T06:27:00.000-08:00

Here are the results of a Live Poster workshop I did with my first year Art Performance & Digital Media students. We took a bunch of Posters for B-Movies and foreign films and re-staged them as sculptural tableaux's.

DYNAMITE FIGHTER

2008-12-03T08:55:00.001-08:00

This is just a quickie, there will be more pictures to follow. I performed as Paul Sykes last Thursday at GSK Contemporary in the Royal Academy, as part of a performance curated my boyleANDshaw and Alexandra Mcgilp. I have a stinking head cold right now, so this is going to be all I will say at the moment. Watch this space for more pics and links to the filmed event.

And finally

2008-10-29T08:11:00.000-07:00

Facepainting at Frieze 2

2008-10-29T08:09:00.001-07:00

Facepainting at Frieze

2008-10-29T07:57:00.000-07:00

Performing the experiment and analyzing the created object

Its been a long time coming, after my great speech about this being a space for this, that and the other. I have been in Paris all summer on a two month residency, and somehow managed not to write a single word about it? In true dyslexic style I will show you what I have been up to recently first, and what I did ages ago later. Confused? Good.
These are some pics from a RCA outreach workshop I did with the very wonderful artist Lucy Pawlak, I will let the pics speak for themselves, needless to say it was a gas!

Dear painter, paint for me - Face painting workshop @ RCA

2008-06-14T08:43:00.000-07:00

This is going to be last entry today, I reckon three in one day is more than enough to make up for my slack effort till now.
On Saturday June the 1st I was led a face-painting workshop in a large mirrored cube at the Royal College of Art for OutReach RCA and as part of the Summer 2008 MA show. As my trusty sidekick I had Boo Saville, Ellie Tobin, Ryan and Ritta (Both RCA students) and the help of the excellent photographer Michele Panzeri. The fancy dress shop where I used to work (The Carnival Store) had kindly loaned me a bunch of wigs, which added to my arsenal of false noses, masks and face-paints.
The idea was simply to transform people into walking works of Art and send them off into the gallery to confuse and bewilder people. It was a little scary, not least cos I was in an enormous mirrored cube outside the RCA but also 'cos it was essentially a face painting workshop and I had this horrid fear we would spend all day painting Spiderman and Hulk faces on children. How wrong I turned out to be. It turned out to be really successful, we accosted this great kid who took it upon himself to drag people off the street and out of the gallery into our den of identity makeover. Kid, I don't remember your name, but if you're reading this, you were a legend. I reckon of the whole day, Boo looked best as the Elvis man with an orange chin.... winner.
What was really great about the day apart from all the obvious stuff, was the realization that it was a really great way to involve people in my practice. It opened it up to a new dialogue with the public where they felt actively involved in the creation of something. Ok, it was just face painting to a point, but I reckon there is scope for this to happen in a gallery environment so that the traditional divide between 'art' and 'reality' is blurred somewhat. I think part of the reason it worked so well is that we stuck to our guns with what we wanted to paint on people, so there was a really good shock factor on their behalf when they finally looked in a mirror at the end. All in all, a rather good days work.

Don't Look Now

2008-06-14T06:37:00.000-07:00

Over the last two years since my residency in Paris I have been dressing up as the Lady in Red, no not Chris De Burgh's lady in red. The inspiration for the Lady in Red comes from a moment I witnessed in Paris at the main train station.
Me and Boo were walking along eating croissants and drinking coffee when we noticed what looked like a child dressed head to toe in red, walking the wrong way up an escalator. From afar it looked like the figure was trying in vain to get to the top, where a father like figure carrying two suitcases was waiting.
Boo and I both thought this was a tad odd, but also not really that crazy as this is the kind of thing kids do. As we both get closer we realize that this is in-fact an adult lady! We take adjacent escalator and head up so as to get a look at her face.
The moment slowly arrives and we turn to look at her face. Slowly she turns her sweaty brow and greasy hair, with sunken eyes and hollow cheeks the woman in her 30's turns to look at me. Her eyes are totally blank, her arms are covered in cuts and tattered old plasters. I take a deep breath and as we both reach the top, as if it were a carefully orchestrated performance, the lady stops walking and at the exact same moment as the suitcase man steps and heads towards her. They both reach the bottom and walk off together as if nothing ever happened.

Since that moment, I have re-staged the event three times. Once in Bayswater shopping centre and twice in Elephant and castle. I am still not not exactly sure why, but I found something powerful within that moment of reveal which I wanted to recreate and capture. There was point of contradiction, where humor met discomfort and I felt I had been brought back to reality with a renewed sense of self.

So having digressed massively I return to this entry entitled Don't Look Now. Which is in a way me explaining why after two years I am metaphorically laying this part real-part fictional character to rest rest. This character, who on film is eternally marching upwards and never getting anywhere, has at last reached her destination as is marching no more.

I will try to explain. Recently, and for the first time I watched 'Don't Look Now'. I was knocked for six by the beautifully shot studio scene at the beginning of the film, where Donald Sutherland tries in vain to rescue his drowned daughter from a pond in his back garden. The daughter is wearing this amazing red coat and I immediately thought, I have got to use this scene, remake it, or something!?
It was quite soon after this line of thought had been planted that I had some tragic news which I am still reeling from. I found out my Father who I have never met, but have searched for over the last few years had passed away six years ago.
My Dad the enigma, someone who I only have a couple of old photo's of, is now and will always remain a mystery to me. Having spent much of my life asking unanswerable questions I have now at least got closure and peace of mind on something that has both haunted and inspired me for so long. I cant really explain why, but laying my Lady in Red to rest seems like a appropriate end to a story with no end in sight.

These are a couple of stills from the as yet unedited film. Which may, or may not, be shown soon in LA at the Playboy Mansion as part of a literary event tied to the Oscars, details to follow watch this space.

The Man Who Fell to Earth

2008-06-14T03:04:00.000-07:00

Cripes almighty its taken me a long time to get my second entry on here. Anyway, I will do my best to bring you up to speed.
On April 28th I performed "You have to fear where you're going... if Jesus is coming with you" at RUN gallery in a group show curated by Adham Faramawy. It was a riot, drag, smoke, feathers and tears and included artists: THEO ADAMS, MILLIE BROWN, FANCY CHANCE, HUGH CHAPMAN, AMY MCDONOUGH, EDDIE PEAKE, RUSSELLA, AND LUKE SELLERS. For my bit I was lucky enough to work with a trio of ace students from Kingston University, DAVE ORWELLl, ROSIE TYHURST and PETER GEORGALLOU ... these three are ones to watch.

In the beginning...

2008-04-18T05:00:00.001-07:00

Well here I go, my first entry. My aim for this blog is to create a space which reflects my thoughts, ideas, culdesacs and pipe dreams which will hopefully turn into a sustainable thread of my practice. Over time I would like this space to act a portal for collaboration and to serve as point of departure for fledgling ideas. Well, as with all new ventures the most important thing is to get going and see, what, if anything comes of it? Tally ho!!