10.04 The
Lido Show (7th August 1993)
The 'Dive-In Show' at
Brockwell Park Lido was announced in a Centre-page advert in a Exploding
programme of 24th July 1993
This was a major event
showing at least 75 works with a budget of £1200 and a paying audience of over
2000. Along with the media
attention it generated this was the event that established Exploding Cinema as
an underground institution and myth.[1]
Brockwell Lido at that time
was unused and the pool was dry. It was a medium sized municipal swimming pool
with a simple modernist architectural charm. Changing rooms and other spaces
make up about half of the perimeter. These derelict spaces were used to house
installations and screenings. The pool had previously been squatted and used
for various parties and raves.
(See Illustration
17)
This was the Exploding
Cinema show that many people remember for the simple reason of its scale. At
the time the collective numbered more than 20 people. It is not remembered very
fondly by some of the current (1997 /99) members who were in the collective at
that time. Although for Caroline Kennedy it was the event at which she joined
the collective. It provided
technical headaches of mammoth proportions. Several screenings ran in parallel
using the outbuildings and the poolside cafe as well as projections in the
empty pool itself.
I attended this event and as
an audience member my memory is of experimental no budget film culture on an
incredible scale. Impressive because of the amount it concentrated into one
space, on one evening. Never had I seen so much projection equipment brought
into action in one venue. (The later Volcanos are bigger but spread out on
various sites over a week.) On top of that the empty pool did provide a
uniquely memorable setting.
The Lido has a place in the
hearts of most people brought up locally. Perhaps the event played some part in
the revival of the pool which has since be taken over by private enterprise and
regained its former summer glory and has itself been the subject of several
documentary films.[2]
Here is an account from the
interview with Caroline Kennedy:
What
I did in the Lido was quite a good installation. It was in the shower room and
changing room. I got loads of tiles, and I put thatƒ magic stuff which you
paint on white tiles and you can print on to it. And I had taken loads of
photographs of lidos, people just swimming and lounging. I printed them all on
these tiles. And a lot of the tiles were falling off the wall, it was like a
really wrecked shower, and I just put them on the ground. And I had a loop of,
I think it was me swimming under water, filling the entire space. And there was
sound, and smells like bleach. And the sound of water, and people showering,
and distant voices.
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