Audio visual artists Greenaway & Greenaway have been commissioned to create 12 minute piece to mark the opening of Waltham Forest London Borough of Culture 2019.
Projected onto Waltham Forest’s town hall from the 9th to the 13th January, Greenaway & Greenaway, in collaboration with award-winning musician Talvin Singh, have created a twelve minute piece that celebrates Welcome To The Forest as part of the Waltham Forest being the first London Borough of Culture.
The artist’s piece is a combination of part documentary, part video mapping, part music video. Titled Into the Forest it is a site-specific and site-responsive light artwork that features 1,000 video portraits, 10 local businesses, 12 spoken word artists and 4 dancers. In its creation, the piece has had input from local business, institutions and independent artists and craft makers.
By using film and animation, the project tells the story of Waltham Forest as seen through the eyes of those who live in the borough. Throughout it explores the entirety of the Borough through Chingford Walthamstow Markets, Leyton Orient Football Club, Whipps Cross Hospital, High Roads of
Leyton and Leytonstone, Baptist churches, mosques, and Hindi temples.
Greenaway & Greenaway was established in 2009 by brothers Jude and Jolyon, who share a similar attitude and approach towards their artistic endeavours, leading to an organic production process that results in a strong signature style of work. This collaborative process of disciplines, crafting artistic and commercial work, allows them to forge dynamic films for spaces that is a hybrid of video, animation and sound.
Talking about the commission Greenaway & Greenaway said: “As local artists, this felt like a particularly important commission – one that also marks G&G being ten years in partnership. It’s a great way to start
the year. This is an incredibly exciting, high profile project that has needed a lot of energy, brainpower and attention to develop the ideas to get it right, but this is married with the response to the local responsibility. We’ve not just worked with one or two people, but a dozen that are all passionate and have something meaningful to say. It has become a collage of collective thought that we’ve woven into a conversation, and although is still top-line, this allows our message to be representative whilst staying ubiquitous. It’s been like making the jigsaw parts before we knew what it’d look like, and now we just need to put it together.”
Into the Forest will be shown as part of the Welcome to the Forest event from the 11th to the 13th January.