The Inspiration Gene: Artist and set designer Es Devlin’s gripping convo on This Cultural Life.
It was when Es Devlin said she had a website to show off her work at a time when few set designers had sites during the crackling days of broadband that I stopped marking any more assessments. I’m already behind. Drats!
Radio has always been in my shadow, ever since boarding school in Ghana in the 70s, Saturday’s Ned Sherrin and Victor Lewis Smith n’ all at Uni in Leicester in the late 80s, and then there was a period where I actually worked in radio, Radio 4, as well. I actually did.
I’m now spending the best part of my afternoon scouring Devlin’s site and retrieving the bits of conversation I missed on BBC Sounds. Nope, I’ve still not mastered assessing papers and listening to radio at the same time. Perhaps too, it was something to do that morning writing a piece on Scale and Storytelling.
Funny how cognitive disparate thoughts float about to make sense. Or perhaps it was Devlin talking about the cube. Ah the cube. I once made a Rubik cube as a non linear documentary featuring a story I made on Intelligence and a former head of the CIA.
I showcased it in the mid 2000s which caught the attention of Apple and Jude kelly CBE, Artistic Director of the Southbank Centre . It was one of the reasons she offered me a position as one of her Artists in Residence, alongside Jeremy Turner, Lemn Sissay and the Wilson sisters. Them days!
This Cultural Life presented by John Wilson on Radio 4 prompted a tweet. My afternoon of marking ruined, the papers will have to wait a bit more.
Devlin’s breathtaking catalogue of work is pure lush. I mean proper lush. The bit about her jumping on a plane to collaborate with Kanye, with little knowledge of him, and him probably thinking she was in the neighbourhood was adventurism radio that further got me leaning in. And I thought my flight to NY to buy my first laptop and fly back home was trippy!
Art’s serendipity often yields accidental but brilliant pieces. Devlin on Adele’s visual theme was one of those moments. Everyone’s saying it won’t work but the artist’s prerogative takes over. What if it doesn’t work? I’m wondering what it was like at that moment of truth. See I told you it would work.
At the Southbank, composer Shirley Thompson was putting together President Obama’s 100 Days celebration with an original score. With four weeks to spare, she asked me to create the visuals. Four days to the show and I hadn’t cracked it. I’m major panicking. Then I have an epiphany and a frantic phone call to a friend in the US, who rings his friend, who rings me — leaving a message on my phone.
Phew! Pulled it off with no hint of the stress I’d suffer being made public to the audience. A day later my friend rings me. “How did it go?”, he asked. “Great!” I said. “So Pete rang you”, he asked. “Yes, really helped me out”. “Good friend of yours?”, I asked. “Well yeah”. Two exchanges later it twigs. It was Pete De Souza, Obama’s photographer.
I’m scrolling back through bits on ES’s responses. Good brain food. My Twitter is showing a notification. It’s a like from Edwina Pitman, who is the producer of this fine show.
Just so happens too they’re celebrating the a year of happy productions.
I’m back to work. Nice bit of radio that! So like I’ve had this idea, about turning some radio archive I stumbled across in my garage during lockdown. It’s from a show I produced as freelance producer/presenter in the 90s. Some of the interviews include this made one with Fela Kuti
I’ll drop Ms Pitman a line. She might know someone who know’s someone who’s up for a conversation. Well if it worked for Devlin with Trevor Nunn, it’s worth trying.
Dr David Dunkley Gyimah is a Reader/ Associate Professor at the University of Cardiff and will be a panelist at the forthcoming conference in Bedford BBC 1922–2022.
