Stuart Croft - Century City

Stuart Croft - Century City
8 min 46 sec, continuous gallery loop
As an artist and a film maker, Stuart Croft utilizes the aesthetics and linguistics of cinema and presents it in the context of a gallery. Writing and directing dialogue based narratives, Croft's films often weave together Hollywood styled characters in an endless cycle of story telling. Always shown on loop the films never have a beginning nor an end just an elliptical narrative that folds into itself. 

In Century City, the murder of an actress prompts an illogical, circular phone conversation between a detective in Cape Town and a movie director in Los Angeles. As the plot unravels so does the fiction of the film studio. Lighting rigs, camera's and scenery flats start to interrupt the narrative and thus our attention is directed towards devices and structures deployed in film making.

This is an edited clip from the film (8 min 46 sec) which is played on a loop. Century City was also shown by Open File as part of 'Admitting the Flats' at MK Gallery, May 2012

Stuart Croft - The Death Waltz

Recently shown at Fred gallery in London. Stuart Crofts film The Death Waltz is a eery recount of a ghost story at a dinner party. In a strange and displaced narrative the story unfolds telling us of two soldiers Celia and Joe on leave from an un-named war, in an un-known time. Their homecoming party turns into a horrifying and frenzied waltz whereby two characters become horribly disfigured.

The 8 minute super 8mm film is looped demanding Celia and Joe to return to the party year after year for their deathly dance.

Here is a short clip below.