Isaac Julien’s latest video installation, Stones Against Diamonds, has been on quite a tour this year. A five-screen preview popped up at the Venice Biennale, a 10-screen presentation at Art Basel and a 15-screen walk-through version arrived at Art Basel Miami (the largesse and, credit where credit is due, vision of the Rolls-Royce Art Programme made the film’s production and peripateticism possible). With each expansion the work becomes more mesmerising; a series of spectacular, sparkling meditative loops played out in multiple locations.
Julien explains that the piece – shown in Miami at the National YoungArts Foundation’s wonderful Jewel Box Building, set behind the landmark Bacardi Tower in the Wynwood Arts District – was inspired by a letter sent by the Brazilian architect, curator and designer Lina Bo Bardi. In the letter, collected in the anthology Stones Against Diamonds, Bo Bardi explains to her husband that she prefers the organic beauty of uncut and semi-precious stones to cut, shaped and polished diamonds.
Julian took this as a cue to head north to find a place where nature does its own cutting, shaping and polishing. Taking 50 uninsurable crew with him, Julien spent five days filming in the isolated ice caves of Vatnajökull, Europe’s biggest glacier, 400 miles south of Rekjavik in Iceland. (Julien is an Iceland veteran filming parts of 2004’s True North and last year’s Play time there).
Stones Against Diamonds has the actress, performer and Julien’s muse Vanessa Myrie, wandering the frozen landscape in which, in a mixture of CGI and actual carpentry, Julian has placed a version of Bo Bardi’s spiral staircase at Solar do Unhão in Bahia, Brazil. A tangential leap but it works wonderfully. Julien says he sees the ice caves as natural versions of Bo Bardi’s own organic architecture. He also uses the glass and concrete easels Bo Bardi developed for the Museu de Arte de São Paulo, creating panels of glacial landscape and echoing the multi-screen installation itself.
Julien has a continuing fascination with Bo Bardi and his currently plotting his next piece, Seven Faces of Lina Bo Bardi. He has spent three years researching Bo Bardi, interviewing artists and architects, including those who knew and worked with her. And next year he will travel to Sao Paulo, Rio and Salvador to work on a 'lyrical' take on Bo Bardi’s life, work and ideas. Brazilian actresses Fernanda Montenegro and Fernanda Torres will play the mature and young Bo Bardi respectively while the musician Gilberto Gill, a friend of Bo Bardi’s, will work on the score.
The piece was shot on location, deep in the glacial caves in south-west Iceland’s remote wilderness. Pictured: Stones Against Diamonds, a work by Isaac Julien for the Rolls-Royce Art Programme.
The film is based on a letter written by architect and designer Lina Bo Bardi, where she states her preference for semi-precious stones over gemstones, hence the name ’Stones Against Diamonds’ (installation pictured).
Pictured: Installation image of Stones Against Diamonds, by Isaac Julien for the Rolls-Royce Art Programme.
INFORMATION
For more information, visit Isaac Julien’s website
-
A revamped Edinburgh apartment combines Californian-style modernism with modern craftArcher + Braun have transformed an apartment in a historic house with finely tuned contemporary additions and sympathetic attention to detail
-
Formafantasma’s biodiversity-boosting installation in a Perrier Jouët vineyard is cross-pollination at its bestFormafantasma and Perrier Jouët unveil the first project in their ‘Cohabitare’ initiative, ‘not only a work of art but also a contribution to the ecosystem’
-
Gingerbread City: architects sculpt London out of the season's favourite treatUntil December 29 in Chelsea, see London brought to life in a seasonal-appropriate medium by leading architects and designers
-
‘It creates mental horrors’ – why The Thing game remains so chillingWallpaper* speaks to two of the developers behind 2002’s cult classic The Thing video game, who hope the release of a remastered version can terrify a new generation of gamers
-
Out of office: what the Wallpaper* editors have been doing this weekA snowy Swiss Alpine sleepover, a design book fest in Milan, and a night with Steve Coogan in London – our editors' out-of-hours adventures this week
-
What to look out for at Art Basel Miami Beach 2024Art Basel Miami Beach returns for its inaugural edition under new director Bridget Finn, running 6-8 December, with 286 international exhibitors and a packed week of parties, pop-up, and special projects
-
Wu Tsang reinterprets Carmen's story in BarcelonaWu Tsang rethinks Carmen with an opera-theatre hybrid show and a film installation, recently premiered at MACBA in Barcelona (until 3 November)
-
Miu Miu’s Women’s Tales film series comes to life for Art Basel ParisIn ‘Tales & Tellers’, interdisciplinary artist Goshka Macuga brings Miu Miu’s Women’s Tales film series for Art Basel Paris to life for the public programme
-
Art Basel returns to Paris: here is everything to see and doArt Basel Paris 2024 (18 - 20 October 2024) returns, opening at the newly renovated Grand Palais
-
Don't miss these films at the BFI London Film Festival 2024The BFI has announced the lineup for their 68th festival, and it's a stellar one
-
Brutalism in film: the beautiful house that forms the backdrop to The Room Next DoorThe Room Next Door's production designer discusses mood-boarding and scene-setting for a moving film about friendship, fragility and the final curtain
