Television Interruptions

Dans son essai "Artists' Television: Interruptions - Interventions", Stephen Partridge écrit que cette collection de vidéos est aussi nommée TV Interruptions et également a été publiée en tant que 7 TV Pieces. (Source, Stephen Partridge, "Artists' Television: Interruptions - Interventions", REWIND| British Artists' Video in the 1970s & 1980s, Stephen Partridge & Sean Cubitt (dir.), East barnet, John Libbey Publishing, Herts, 2012, p. 75-90.)

"7 Parts:
Interruption piece, 2.2mins
Window piece, 2.2mins
Tap piece, 3.3mins
Time-lapse piece, 3.3mins
Pans piece, 2.3mins
TV shoot-out piece, 2.4mins
Two figures piece, 3.1mins" (Source, cité depuis le site web Rewind)

Image from each of the 7 TV Pieces. (Source, site web Rewind)

"Commissioned as part of the Scottish Arts Council's Locations Edinburgh event, 1971. Broadcast unannounced and uncredited by Scottish Television, 1971." (Source, cité depuis le site web Rewind

"I was refused the use of video that was available, external to broadcasting in those days, by Scottish Television. The Unions, who were very much stronger in those days, God bless them, wouldn’t accept work made on low format video, which was the only thing available outside of broadcast. But they would accept 16mm film. So I made those pieces as TV Interruptions, unannounced. I consider them video because ultimately they went on video to be broadcast. They transferred them to 2”. They used heavy 2’’ video in those days, RCA stuff. But, more importantly culturally, I saw video and TV as synonymous." Interview with David Hall, Interview by Dr Jackie Hatfield, Friday 9th December 2005. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

“Conceived and made specifically for broadcast, these were transmitted by Scottish TV during the Edinburgh Festival. The idea of inserting them as interruptions to regular programmes was crucial and a major influence on their content. That they appeared unannounced with no titles (two or three times a day over ten days) was essential. To get a TV company to agree to show them, and with these conditions, was a coup... “ The transmissions were a surprise, a mystery. No explanations, no excuses. Reactions were various. I viewed one piece in an old gents’ club. The TV was permanently on but the occupants were oblivious to it, reading newspapers or dozing. When the TV began to fill with water newspapers dropped, the dozing stopped. When the piece finished normal activity was resumed. When announcing to shop assitants and engineers in a local TV shop that another was about to appear they welcomed me in. When it finished I was obliged to leave quickly by the back door. I took these as positive reactions.” (David Hall, Source, 19:4:90 Television Interventions, [s.l.], Fields and Frames Productions ltd., 1990.) (Source, cité depuis le site web Rewind)

"Although each Piece has its own specific quality and repays repeated viewing in varying degrees, Hall has insisted [that] 'the pieces were not intended as declarations of art in their own right, they did not assume that privilege. They were gestures and foils within the context of TV. They needed TV, they depended on it.' Hall is critical of specialist arts programmes [art galleries on air] which 'call the few and exclude the many', and in a letter to Studio International [March 1972] Alistair MacIntosh, curator of the Edinburgh event, echoed Hall's strictures. He pointed out that the Pieces reached 'an audience of 250,000 per night. They didn't know what they were looking at and didn't expect it, so all the rubbish surrounding art was circumvented." (Source, Mick Hartney, "InT/Ventions..", Diverse Practices: A Critical Reader on British Video Art, Julia Knight (dir.), University of Luton Press, Luton, 1996) (Source, cité depuis le site web Rewind)

"the Pieces [were not] calculated simply to alert or confuse the TV audience. In one 'Two Figures' the respective stillness and frenetic movement of the figures in a room depended for its perceptual effect on a complex interpretative process on the part of the viewer whereby the 'reading' of the technical manipulation of the scene - i.e. the unnatural acceleration of the moving figure - is subverted by the prolonged stationary presence of the seated figure. In this Piece - in my opinion the strongest - by juxtaposing within a single scene a figure whose behaviour is largely cinematically-generated with one whose appearance suggests the medium is transparent, Hall brought vividly to the fore the inherent contradictions of that medium" (Source : Mick Hartney, "InT/Ventions..", Diverse Practices: A Critical Reader on British Video Art, Julia Knight (dir.), University of Luton Press, Luton, 1996.) (Source, cité depuis le site web Rewind)

"In 1971 David Hall made ten TV Interruptions for Scottish Television which were broadcast, unannounced, in August and September of that year (a selection of seven of the ten was later issued as 7 TV Pieces). These, his first works for television, are examples of what television interventions, as they came to be known, can be. Although a number of interventions have subsequently been made by various artists, the 7 TV Pieces have not been surpassed, except by Hall himself in This is a Television Receiver for BBC TV in 1976, and Stooky Bill TV for Channel 4 TV in 1990..." (Source, Nicky Hamlyn, "FILM VIDEO TV: on David Hall, David Larcher & Guy Sherwin", Coil magazine 9/10, London, December 2000.) (Source, cité depuis le site web Rewind)

"These works have come to be regarded as the first example of British artists' television and as an equally formative moment in British video art..." (Source,chronology in Julia Knight (dir.), Diverse Practices: A Critical Reader on British Video Art, University of Luton Press, Luton, 1996.) (Source, cité depuis le site web Rewind)

Interruption Piece:
"..we see a TV cabinet burning.. periodically a voice calls out 'interruption'.. and there is the implication that a burning TV makes better television than most of the output to which we are subjected."

Window Piece:
"..shots jump through time.. a cast shadow changes position and finally disappears.."

Tap Piece:
"with water, is.. the most memorable, its form comprehensible through one or two iconic moments.."

Time-lapse Piece:
"..wryly demonstrates that while watching TV may be engrossing, watching other people watch TV is a lot less so."

Pans Piece:
"..the camera pans across a TV-shaped opening [onto] an Edinburgh street.. repeated ten times.. framed within the frame of a tv set."

Shoot-Out Piece:
"..three camera operators perform a live filming event at a busy road junction.. [ultimately] the presence of Hall's camera pointing directly back at us reminds us that every shot on TV is somebody's point of view, not some disembodied omniscient perspective."

Two Figures Piece:
"..by juxtaposing within a single scene a figure whose behaviour is largely cinematically generated with one whose appearance suggests the medium is transparent, Hall [brings] vividly to the fore the inherent contradictions of the medium." (Source, Nicky Hamlyn, Film Art Phenomena, London, BFI Publishing, 2003.) (Source, cité depuis le site web Rewind)

7 TV Pieces Preview Card for Royalty Preview Theatre, London, 23rd November 1971. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

Locations Edinburgh catalogue, cover, credits and forward. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

Locations Edinburgh catalogue, David Hall detail. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

Text written by David Hall about 7 TV Pieces in 1971. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

ICA Programme Notes for Vertical, 7 TV Pieces and Timecheck, May 1972. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

TV Today press clipping referring to 7 TV Pieces and Cinema, 1972. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

5 Films proposal to ACGB, including notes on 7 TV Pieces [1972?]. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

Programme for English Avantgarde cinema, Millennium, New York, 16th April 1974. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

7 TV Pieces text written by David Hall in 1990 for 19:4:90 Television Interventions Catalogue. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

Canal+ TV (France) licence purchase of parts of TV Interruptions, 1992. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

Exhibition brochure for Television Interventions, A Touring programme of Artists, Fields and Frames, 1993, includes information on the work TV Interruptions (7 TV Pieces). (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

Programme with information on works exhibited at Cinematic Exploration - Expanding Screens 1960 - 1975, January 25th - 30th 2004, Lumiere Cinema, includes Hall's T.V Interruptions (7 T.V pieces). (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

David hall & Tony Sinden (for the catalogue), selected works and Bio, undated. (Source, pdf, site web Rewind)

Cette série a été reproposée par l'artiste en 2006 dans une installation : "These works were Initially broadcast as television interventions but subsequent single-screen gallery viewings cannot induce a sense of the original context. An alternative proposal exhibits them as a multi-faceted installation, all seven displayed at the same time, each continuously looping on seven separate monitors randomly placed in close proximity in a single space. The sound conflicts and viewers simultaneously see parts of others as they attempt to concentrate on one. This induces some confusion, as it was when they first appeared on TV, creating "difficulties" analogous to the original experience.... It has the feeling of intervention." (David Hall, 2005) (Source, cité depuis le site web Rewind)