Ring of Fire

A slow-motion video of a 1970s Evel Knievel wind-up toy being jumped through the middle of a burning car tyre (set up like a flaming hoop that stunt-bikers jump their bikes through).

The video starts as a close crop, front-on, to the centre/hole of the tyre.

The tyre is doused liberally in flammable liquid and set alight.

Through the hole, in the distance, we see the toy being wound up and released, jumping through the centre of the tyre off a small ramp.

After the toy has passed through the tyre, the camera slowly pans out to show the entire burning tyre, full-frame.

For several minutes (final length to be decided in the edit) the film focuses on the burning tyre, before fading to black.

A Repurposed Statue

The world is in a constant state of upheaval and in recent years we’ve seen various uprisings and societal collapses. What often goes along with that is the destruction of public statues and monuments representative of a formerly oppressive regime.

Statues tend to be heavy things, so when they’re not being dragged into Bristol docks, they’re often dismantled using cranes.

I’ve often been struck by the powerful images of statues of dictators being removed from their plinths, hoisted high in the air, by a chain round their neck. There’s something very brutal and precarious about this image - like a metaphorical lynching of the oppressor.

For this work I propose a temporary (could be permanent) public sculpture that consists of a removed-statue, hanging by a chain round its neck, dangling from a crane.