Newlyn Filmhouse, Cornwall, UK - 26th of July, 2pm BST (3pm CET)
International Festival of Performing Arts, Plocku, Poland - 26th of July, 3pm CET (2pm BST)
55minutes | Super 16mm to 4K | Exhibition: Digital 4K, Colour, Stereo, 1.66:1
Shot entirely on expired 16mm film stock, Expiry is a collaboration between filmmaker Huw Wahl and his father Ken Turner (b. 1926), the oldest living performance artist and painter in the UK. Through movement, breath, painting, conversations between his parents, and a series of environmental and human encounters, this deeply personal work is a love letter to ageing playfully and the power of creative action. Released as Ken turns 100, it asks what expiry means to us all, for our lives, for our art, and for our planet.
‘Life is short, art long,” says Ken Turner, reading from a book of aphorisms by ancient Greek physician Hippocrates. And he’s half right, really, because at 100 years old – and very possibly the world’s oldest performance artist – art might have been long, but life hasn’t been all that short for him, either. And he has filled those years to the brim with radicalism, experimentalism and a singular dedication to pushing ideas as far as he can make them go (...) We’re joined by his son, the film-maker Huw Wahl, whose tender, grainy filmic portrait of his father plays on a loop in the show. “I think his painting is getting better and better, in a way, because he’s becoming more and more playful,” says Wahl. “But Ken’s always been childish, in the best sense.”
The Guardian, Eddy Frankel
