John Akomfrah’s acclaimed film, Vertigo Sea (2015), which was unveiled at the Venice Biennale this year, is due to be premiered in the UK in January. The three-screen installation ponders man’s relationship with the ocean through, among other things, the whaling industry, the history of slavery and the refugee crisis. It is due to go on show at the Arnolfini in Bristol on 16 January 2016 (until 10 April) before touring to Turner Contemporary in Margate and the Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester as part of the Arts Council England strategic touring programme. More venues are expected to be confirmed.
Vertigo Sea fuses archival footage of the whaling industry with shots of ocean life—taken with the BBC natural history unit—off the coast of the Isle of Skye, the Faroe Islands and northern Norway. It also includes shots of African migrants crossing the ocean in journeys fraught with danger, echoing the current crisis.
The Arnolfini exhibition coincides with Akomfrah’s first show with Lisson Gallery, which will present new and recent work by the Ghanaian-born London-based artist (22 January-5 March 2016). Next year also marks the 30th anniversary of Handsworth Songs, a film by the Black Audio Film Collective (of which Akomfrah is a member) that examined the 1985 riots in Birmingham and London. A spokeswoman for Lisson says there are plans to show the seminal film, which drew crowds when it was shown at Tate Modern in the wake of the 2011 London riots. A venue and date have not been confirmed yet.
