Welcome to the only official site for People Like Us and Vicki Bennett
Danny Snelson presents a series of investigations around an essay on early computer-generated movies at Bell Labs (and the documentaries that accompany them) through the contemporary cipher presented in the digital compilation movie We Edit Life (2002) by People Like Us (Vicki Bennett).
http://vvvnt.com/media/incredible-machines
The collage artist also known as People Like Us talks about her beginnings in experimental radio broadcasting in the second instalment of The Wire’s oral histories series.
Vicki Bennett’s People Like Us began life as a three hour radio show on Brighton’s Festival Radio in 1990 called Gobstopper. She went on to release around 20 solo albums based on her radio sound collages, but after a decade working primarily with sound, has increasingly worked with film and images. She has recently produced collage and split screen work, including 2013’s touring film and performance piece Notations, a film used as a score for improvising musicians.
An advocate of open digital distribution, Bennett’s entire back catalogue is available for download via UbuWeb, and she is also the host of long-running radio show DO or DIY on WFMU. She has collaborated extensively with Ergo Phizmiz, Negativland’s Don Joyce, Wobbly and Kenneth Goldsmith, and many others.
Listen to the interview here:
http://www.thewire.co.uk/audio/in-conversation/oral-histories_vicki-bennett
Or download the file as an mp3:
http://www.thewire.co.uk/download//2014/05/02/The_Wire_Oral_Histories_-_Vicki_Bennett_aka_People_Like_Us_.mp3
“We Are Not Amused” – the second of our two films made for Animate Projects and Channel 4 TV which was screened on 5 September 2013 is now available for viewing:
We Are Not Amused. A film by Vicki Bennett [2013]
Who knows where ideas come from? You or me? Or THEM? The Muses are angry and they want their ideas back! This is a story of thieving and reappropriation, staged on a mythological platform.
Interview with Vicki Bennett
http://www.animateprojects.org/interviews/interview_with_vicki_bennett1
Screenings
August 2015 – uSurp Zone5 Festival, London
March 2015 – Ann Arbor Film Festival
November 2014 – Screening at Other Cinema, San Francisco
August 2014 – Screening of We Are Not Amused at Sao Paulo 25th International Short Film Festival
May 2014 – Screening of We Are Not Amused at Oberhausen Film Festival, London, entered for the International Film Category competition
November 2013 – Underwire Festival, London
November 2013 – Screening of We Are Not Amused and The Golem – An Inanimate Matter at Bradford Animation Festival
Download stills and photos of work in progress from both We Are Not Amused and The Golem – An Inanimate Matter
https://peoplelikeus.org/piccies/random/pictures-and-screenshots.zip
Background on the commission
http://www.animateprojects.org/news/our_secret_monsters_will_be_revealed
Vicki Bennett on Animate Projects website
http://www.animateprojects.org/films/by_artist/b/v_bennett
“The Golem – An Inanimate Matter” – the first of our two films made for Animate Projects and Channel 4 TV which was screened on 21 August 2013 is now available for viewing:
http://vimeo.com/peoplelikeus/golem
Random Acts Secret Monsters Commission – Animate Projects/Channel 4 (2013)
Two films were commissioned, the other being “We Are Not Amused”
Title of film: The Golem, An Inanimate Matter
Name of filmmaker(s): Vicki Bennett
Synopsis of film: The Golem, a monstrous being of inanimate matter from Jewish folklore, is accidentally summoned from a book wreaks havoc through a library.
Interview with Vicki Bennett
http://www.animateprojects.org/interviews/interview_with_vicki_bennett1
Screenings
November 2013 – Screening of We Are Not Amused and The Golem – An Inanimate Matter at Bradford Animation Festival
Download stills and photos of work in progress from both We Are Not Amused and The Golem – An Inanimate Matter
https://peoplelikeus.org/piccies/random/pictures-and-screenshots.zip
More images from The Golem:
http://www.animateprojects.org/news/our_secret_monsters_will_be_revealed
Vicki Bennett on Animate Projects website
http://www.animateprojects.org/films/by_artist/b/v_bennett
Vicki Bennett will be doing an artist talk with some film/audio clips at Liverpool Biennial on 24 August 2013 at 2pm. Details below. Despite what some descriptions say, it is for ALL ages.
http://liverpoolbiennial.co.uk/whatson/future/all/665/experimental-music-school
In the weeks leading up to the online launch of Gesture Piece, Pixel Palace’s Curator for Digital media Arts, Dominic Smith spoke to Vicki Bennett about the development of this film.
The website is dead now, so here below is a copy of the interview.
http://www.thepixelpalace.org/commissions/gesture-piece/interview-with-vicki-bennett
There’s a very nice feature by Colm McAuliffe in today’s Sight and Sound magazine – thanks Colm!
We’ve just done an interview with the WFMU’s Free Music Archive, where we are currently one of the judges in a video competition – take part and have the chance to win an ipad!
Deadline extended to 11th November 2012.
We’re very pleased to have received a favourable review in The Wire Magazine (October 2012) of our forthcoming DVD (and digital download) ((oh, and a 7 inch single!!)) THE KEYSTONE CUT UPS.
We’ll be announcing more about this on 30th September.
Alongside our posting of 25 New Titles for viewing and download on UbuWeb, we are very pleased to have compiled the UbuWeb Top Twenty for September 2012.
You can find it here
And on the UbuWeb homepage, right hand column.
http://ubu.com/resources/feature.html#plu
Paul Hamlyn Foundation, ArtWorks NorthEast: Developing Practice in Participatory Settings
Critical Conversation Series
Venue: Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle Upon Tyne
Date: 8th August 2012 7:00 to 9:00pm
Hosts: The Pixel Palace
Chair: Dominic Smith
Speaker: Vicki Bennett
http://www.thepixelpalace.org/events/critical-conversation-with-vicki-bennett
Background Cultural organisations in the North East of England have a strong record of working with artists to develop participatory arts projects in different settings. As part of a national arts research project funded by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation and designed to facilitate new dialogues around and understandings of participatory arts practice, the University of Sunderland is working with a consortium of regional partners (ArtWorks North East)* to develop a clearer understanding of what makes for good participatory practice. The overarching aim is to establish an innovative and sustainable cross disciplinary approach to creating excellent practice in participatory leadership.
Critical conversations: dialogues around the practice of arts in participatory settings
As part of this, ArtWorks North East is together hosting a series of ‘critical conversations’ over the next 12 months involving artists, participants, host groups and other collaborators from a variety of art forms. We are inviting different people responsible for creating and delivering participatory work to reflect on their practice, and to open that practice up to discussion by others. Each conversation will take place in an open learning atmosphere in which artists/presenters will share their practice with others and where people feel able to ask challenging questions about that practice in appropriate ways.
The Pixel Palace is delivering one of these events on behalf of the University of Sunderland. This event will focus on Participation in Creative Digital Media and online environments. We would like to discuss the different models of practice which exist and seek your views on issues of quality, process and experience. We hope that the opportunity to reflect on practice will be beneficial for those attending as well as informing this research project.
To book a place please email info@thepixelpalace.org
CUTTING ACROSS MEDIA by Kembrew McLeod & Rudolf Kuenzli
We highly recommend this book, which Vicki Bennett has written the back of book blurb for. More info about it here.
Download at UbuWeb http://www.ubu.com/sound/plu_collarge.html
Accompanying the book is a “mixtape” (in digital form!) of our favourite sample or sampled music. Take an epic six hour survey of audio collage with People Like Us’ Collarge, a mixtape commissioned for Kembrew McLeod’s co-edited Cutting Across Media: Appropriation Art, Interventionalist Collage, and Intellectual Property Law, which serves as a companion volume to Creative License. http://creativelicense.info/mixtape.php
