It’s no secret that Oxford has long been an idealised location for film sets; official-looking SUVs with blacked-out windows and attendants in high vis parading up and down Catte Street and around the Rad Cam are a not-unfamiliar sight.
Ideally, we should strike a balance; an awareness of the reality of life at Oxford can co-exist with an appreciation of its grand architecture and historical atmosphere.
Reality television is, then, in many ways a fiction. They tell us they are depicting something akin to an authentic reality, but flatten and stabilise the randomness and contingency of actual life, while refusing to overtly acknowledge the authorial voice behind it.
“Although he and Enron fall, the people who fall with it fall more” – Sour Peach Productions present a compelling and absurd take on the real-life financial scandal
The artist as revolutionary is a wonderful image, and perhaps one that is forced upon creatives of our day. However, it is imperative to recall both the political power of artistic media, and the inherent ideology of created works.
Art and creative expression have always made up our social and sensitive nature, from telling stories, to performing primal dances, to painting scenes of human experience on cave walls.