Margaret Salmon
2021
Bird
Margaret Salmon
A visual and aural riff on the pioneering films of the Children’s Film Fund producer / director Mary Field and her early work for the Secrets of Nature series, Bird is aimed at general audiences with a particular focus on children.With a score by the influential electronic music composer Matthew Herbert, Bird is as much about observation and environment as education and spectatorship, inviting audiences to consider the ways in which cinematic tools – camera, lens, colour, movement, voice, sound – heighten and humanise our interpretation of the natural world.Filmed on 35mm transferred to HD video.
Bird
P.S.
Margaret Salmon
An abstract portrait of a middle aged man, weaving together iconography from a range of film genres including classic Hollywood films from the 40s and New Deal documentaries. P.S. attempts to unravel the nuances of personality & character portrayal through the interaction of sound and image. As a couple engage in an argument, which carries on over the course of an evening, we watch a man, presumably the man speaking, working the land & going about his chores, smoking, walking through a forest and watching fireworks.
P.S.
Home
Margaret Salmon
A woman cares, moves, isolated, repetitive, before being embraced, encountered by a ghost. A 2019 short film commission for Channel 4's Random Acts, the super 16mm work, shot in the Southside of Glasgow, includes music by Victoria Morton, performances by Monika Smekot & Iraya Noble and location sound by Richy Carey.
Home
Mm
Margaret Salmon
Part-feminist linguistic investigation, part-child’s learning tool and celebration of motor sport, a voice-over of words and associations narrates 35mm verité footage of the Berwick Bandits, an all-male Speedway motorcycle team with the mantra ‘No Brakes, No Gears, No Fear’.
Mm
Pyramid
Margaret Salmon
Alban Cocking, Arlo Cocking
Pyramid is a single screen work on Abraham Maslow's theory on the hierarchy of human needs filmed through the rhythms and choreography of middle class South England. Filmed in color and b&w on 16mm film, it continues Salmon's interest in the performance of the artist/cinematographer within both spontaneous and constructed situations and incorporates methods developed by various movements within documentary and avant-garde history. Using an array of sounds, music and conversation as well as silence, Salmon constructs an abstract documentary which both develops and challenges the themes presented in Maslow's theory as well as her own interest in human iconography, stereotype and domestic rhythm. The image of Maslow's pyramid and his pragmatic dissection of human needs and possible motivations provide a system of organization for the family and a philosophical framework for the video.
Pyramid
Oyster
Margaret Salmon
Shot on colour 16mm film, Oyster is a minimalist documentary/cinematic poem showcasing the native oyster and various aspects of its life, history and consumption. Shot underwater in its natural habitat, then detailing the process of harvesting in the waters off the Kent coast, Oyster looks to celebrate British aquatic life, as well as the unique history and commercial legacy of the native oyster.
Oyster
I you me we us
Margaret Salmon
I you me we is a double monitor work which portrays particular visual representations of warmth, care, kinship and growth. It features the hands of lovers and family members, interspersed with texts, words, language and questions posed by the artist.
I you me we us
