Good Morning, Mr Orwell

Nam June Paik, Good Morning Mr Orwell

We are all familiar with video installations. Roam through any gallery on a lazy Saturday afternoon, and you’re likely to see at least one of these somewhat incongruous beasts in amidst the paintings and sculptures. You may watch, you may not, but you recognise this as an art form.

Now turn back the clock to 1984. This year has many associations – literary and otherwise – but many will not be aware that this is when video installations were invented.

Good Morning, Mr. Orwell, on show at Space Studios this month, was the first international video installation. It took place on New Year’s Day 1984, linking WNET TV in New York and the Centre Pompidou in Paris together with broadcasters in Germany and South Korea via live satellite. The event was broadcast on American television and seen by an estimated 25 million people worldwide.

The list of participants in this iconic performance reads like a roll-call of late 20th century artistic luminaries: John Cage, Laurie Anderson, Joseph Beuys, Philip Glass, Alan Ginsberg, Merce Cunningham.

The artist behind the installation was South Korean-born artist Nam June Paik, who has since been credited with inventing video art.

Paik began working with the medium in Korea in the early 1960s, before moving to New York in 1964. He developed video art over a career spanning more than three decades.

The original performance of Good Morning, Mr. Orwell was plagued by technical problems; nevertheless, the resulting video has become a classic, providing an upbeat message that the dire predictions of George Orwell have not materialised.

Good Morning, Mr. Orwell
21 January – 5 March 2011
Space Studios
129-131 Mare Street E8 3RH

Opening times: Mon-Fri 10am-5pm, Saturday 12-4pm
Tel: 020 8525 4330