The Front ’
Jo Richardson
Artists get out in front
Capital buildings to be illuminated for three-month art experiment. Words: Helen Monaghan
s the last firework explodes to celebrate another new year.
Edinburgh can expect to see illuminations of a very different
kind over the winter months. Edinburgh art collective Djinniditto's ambitious and innovative project The Other Slide will project the work of nearly 100 artists onto glass fronted buildings in the city. Kicking off at the Scotsman building on Holyrood Road on Saturday 18 January. the monumental slide show will travel on a weekly basis to other buildings including Patersons SA. the Apex Hotel, the Festival Theatre. the Royal Lyceum and culminating at Ocean Terminal in Leith on
Saturday 15 March.
Djinniditto‘s founder Paul Macgee. whose drive and determination has made Such an
‘lt’s going against convention and going for mass exposure’
ambitious project come to fruition. believes
there are many artists out there wno are still lingering in obscurity. The Other Slide will not only give them the expOSure they deserve. but also will reach a vast and new audience.
‘We aim to be all incluswe and include as much as we can, but that's not to say that we'll be taking away from the quality.‘ says Macgee. ‘What this exhibition is abOut is going against convention and going for mass exposure. I like the fact that so many people are gomg to be
Alex Ferns: ‘clesm oi soaps’
4 THE LIST 2 to Jan 700:5
exposed to art. so why not make it cool and accessible?‘
This unconventional way of presenting art is the hallmark of Djinniditto. Since April 2002. Macgee. together with fellow artist Grace Maran has been running club nights at Ego to show art in slide form along with experimental music. Profits from the club night go back into funding the organisation's activities.
But it's not just about being unconventional. For many graduates leaving an college. getting an exhibition is becoming increasingly difficult. More and more independent organisations such as Djinniditto are springing up as a matter of necessity.
'Around 90% of the artists who have graduated within the last four years have said to me that they were either completely clueless coming out
of college or were at first fired up when they left college but couldn't get a show.‘ says Macgee.
Djinniditto is certainly making attempts to readdress this as well as
changing people's perception of contemporary art. With plans to take the slide show to Glasgow and London. the grOup also plans. depending on funding. to showcase the work of over 50 artists in a huge warehouse exhibition. We await in eager anticipation.
TV’s Trevor boxes clever
On location with Glasgow’s favourite hardman. Words: Louise Prendergast
lex Ferns. the Lennoxtown actor who
played bad boy Trevor in EastEnders.
has just finished filming his debut feature film. Maridancin', in Glasgow. The scene is vaguely familiar: a building burns. smoke belches from a top floor window and the neon blue flashing lights of police cars and fire engines light up the set. But this isn‘t Albert Square. This is lbrox Parish Church and ‘Black Jimmy‘ Kerrigan, the central character played by Ferns is an ex-boxer who has just been released from prison. It's only been a few years. but Glasgow has changed — and so has he.
While the film noir gangster genre has been used to portray Glasgow's dark edges before. Maridancin' is not of the bleak. slit-your-wrists- on-tl re-way-home ilk of many British films. It carries a message of hope, which is what attracted Ferns to the role in the first place. ‘l‘ve
washed myself clean of soaps.‘ he says. tongue firmly in cheek. ‘My character in Manda/rein is a reformed hardman who is trying to do something positive. which makes a real change from playing Trevor. We've been filming in and around Govan and there's a lot of hardship here. Some of the people are on the bones of their arses. but there's still a lot of humour.‘
Tipped as the project that will kick-start Ferns' acting career way beyond the realms of soaps. his huge success as television‘s East End arch villain appears to be paying off. ‘He's planets away from soaps.‘ says the film's director Norman Stone, pulling up a chair in the church hall where they are filming. 'l've never been so chuffed at casting anyone in my life. Alex was so right. i though he looked as though he could have been a boxer —- and then I met him and he had boxed. It all just fell into place.’
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Charlize’s Britt part
COMING SOON
Will Smith is to co- produce a new comedy series based on his truly fantastic home life. Happily. neither himself or his co-producer missus Jada Pinkett Smith will appear in the show. But slick Willie will be seen as a futuristic police officer uncovering a massive conspiracy in /, Robot. based on stories by sci-fi lit legend Isaac Asimov . . . Some Asimov fans will undoubtedly be outraged by this but how will Peter Sellers fans react when they hear that Geoffrey Bush is penned in to play the megalomaniacal genius in a forthcoming HBO production? The Life and Death of Peter Sellers will be filmed in London in the spring and also includes Charlize Theron as Britt Ekland . . . Suspect Culture is off to Canada to spread the Lament message but on its return it'll be heading into rehearsals with professional climbers for 8000/71. which should end up at Tramway early in 2004 . . . While rumours rumble over Tony Soprano's long- term future (or otherwise). James Gandolfini is tipped to play the head of another dysfunctional family. Surviving Christmas stars Ben Affleck as a lonely man returning to his childhood home and persuading the family now living there to take him in. Which would be fine except they're an even bigger bunch of psychos than his own mad clan.