Geraldine Snell
Geraldine Snell (b. 1992, Keighley) uses moving image, performance, music, and the written word to navigate being with humour, nuance and awe. Her work is made for and adapted to both online and offline contexts.
Hiya! I’m Geraldine Snell but YOU can call me Geri. My creative endeavours help me to navigate being an overthinking, overloving, oversharing subject in our hyperconnected, oversaturated, dopamine-soaked now. I share the fruits of this in immediate, intimate forms with light & love.
Much like the compact or phone camera I typically use, I start with myself because I’m never without it. From this everyday, autofiction position, I dabble with a range of tools to capture sublime and mundane moments and insights. Sometimes these live on in writing and video; often they are reactivated through musical performance. These processes make Mind Bile manageable: this is a journey of critical self-optimisation and attention conditioning, and YOU are invited.
In addition to exhibition and screening contexts, I embrace digital and social media because they are best placed to house antidotes to the conditions of oversaturation and alienation they can induce. Whether it’s human eyes blinking through an emoji, the grubby phone that draws attention to your own sticky screen, or YouTube tutorials that offer more rumination than instruction, I interrupt image streams and social media zing with intimate works that offer a slow, haptic counterpoint to the speed and slickness around them.
Instagram: @geraldinesnell
Smile (2020)
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, looped video.View in full: https://youtu.be/botlIsRvoYA
This work uses the emoji "Twemoji12_1f60a.svg" by Twitter, licensed under CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0)
Dancing
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, digital video.Cleaning your phone
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, digital video.
rise and shine ~ mOrNiNg RoUTiNe HaCkS
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, digital video, 07:46.Join me as I wake up, play with the light coming through the curtains, attempt to meditate, brush my teeth (the RIGHT way) and start off the day in a positive, present state as forms of internalised and external authority or wisdom encourage or interfere with being.
View in full: https://youtu.be/3czXzcu_LQw
Incantations: Free Joy, To Each (A Devotional Attention Exercise)
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, live vocal performance ft. Smile (2020).Documentation from Intimacy Spills, group show at Barbican Arts Group Trust, February 2020.
View in full: https://youtu.be/P3Oc8FSaH8I
be gone
,Geraldine Snell
, 2019, felt tip drawing, score for performance.'be gone' is a spell that eradicates one’s mind bile; a mantra more powerful than ‘Live Laugh Love’. Originally doodled as a therapeutic, adult colouring type activity, the impact of expunging Mind Bile onto the page in this lurid rendering - even just symbolically - minimised its grip. The drawing was further imbued with magical power when used as a score for looped vocal performances (VIEW HERE: https://youtu.be/TxG_spkeVew) which offered the expressions “anxious feeling really anxious.. ruminate on every possible thing” and the instruction “swap that mind bile for a smile” on a descending harmonic scale.
Still Life Moving: Sublime Presence Activation
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, digital video, 07:30.My housemate Johann and I marvel at the beautiful colours that sunlight through glass cast on the kitchen side before drinking some grape juice and discussing inspiration, motivation and creative intervention with the pug mug.
View in full: https://youtu.be/0kuYWIT_lsU
ENJOY NOW: performing presence (breakfast edition!)
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, digital video.Join me as I attempt to be more present during the breakfast mealtime ritual through admiring sunlight slithers, really SMELLING that grapefruit, watching the full duration of the kettle boiling, being jolted into the past by the wistful sight of steam rising from the cup before me, and feebly resisting the phone which urges me to ENJOY NOW as I switch it on. View in full link: https://youtu.be/aY2BrtdbYK4
soft instructions: take time
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, digital video, 10:00.An intimate, slow film documenting my attempt to be more present in nature. In a domestic garden, long shots of passing clouds, swaying branches and lemon balm growing through concrete are soundtracked by improvised melodic instructions from behind the camera.
View in full: https://vimeo.com/413512738
soft instructions: slow down
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, HD video.View the full video on: https://youtu.be/tyjAt3xfeI8
Respond, don't react!: Learning presence from dogs
,Geraldine Snell
, 2020, digital video.I try and encourage Mille & Pippa to respond - as opposed to react - to their environment, but ended up learning a bit about presence from them.
overlove: Trailer
,Geraldine Snell
, 2018-2019, non-fiction novella and feature length web series, .Discover the book and watch the full playlist here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIrVNPffgK95zOkt8h8Z8GN8EXIq7GCxn
Curriculum Vitae
Education
2018-2020
Slade School of Fine Art
MFA Fine Art Media
2016-2017
University of Huddersfield
Advanced PGCE Lifelong Learning (Art and Design)
2011-2014
Edinburgh College of Art, BA(Hons) Intermedia
2010-2011
Leeds College of Art, Foundation Diploma in Art and Design
Work Experience
June - September 2020 - Pathway Leader, Foundation Fine Art (maternity), Leeds Arts University
August 2017 - June 2020 - Lecturer in Fine Art (Foundation), Leeds Arts University
October 2016 - June 2017 - PGCE Placement and Associate Lecturer in Fine Art, Foundation, LAU
January 2016 – September 2016 – Library Services Assistant, Leeds College of Art
Exhibitions
Intimacy Spills
Barbican Arts Group Trust, London
February 2020
Ones to Watch
Sunny Bank Mills, Leeds
May 2019
21st Century Fox in the Snow
Embassy, Edinburgh
April 2016
Ex
blip blip blip, Leeds
December 2014
No Shrubs
The Number Shop, Edinburgh
April 2014
Confessional Art/Art Confessions
Edinburgh College of Art
April 2014
Interim
blip blip blip, Leeds
March 2013
Screenings/Events
MIA Screens: Geraldine Snell
Moving Image Artists
April 2020
Exploding Cinema
The Cinema Museum, London
February 2020
Gatherings I: Mascara Film Club
San Mei Gallery, London
February 2020
Platform 1
Bloomsbury Theatre, London
February 2020
Mascara Film Club 04
Mascara Bar, London
October 2019
Moving Image Salon
Jerwood FVU, London
August 2019
Cheap Cheap
Birmingham
April 2019
overlove Launch
Pages of Hackney, London,
October 2018
Hyde Park Book Club Film Night
Leeds
VIA Festival Shorts
Edinburgh
April 2017
this can only be thought of as a monologue within a dialogue
Edinburgh College of Art
March 2017
Salted Findings (NEO NEO // Extreme Past)
Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh
2016
Be In Touch
Embassy, Edinburgh
August 2015
Residencies
Centre Pompadour
Picardie, France
July/August 2018
GoreTex
Comar An Tobar, Tobermory, Isle of Mull
January 2014
Publications
overlove
Dostoyevsky Wannabe
2018