Professor Steve Hawley
Professor Emeritus
www.stevehawley.info
Steve Hawley is an artist who has been working with film and video since 1981, and his work has been shown at video festivals and broadcast worldwide since then. He has been collaborating with Tony Steyger off and on since their video The Science Mix was shown at the Stedelijk and MoMA NY in 1983. His original preoccupation was with language and image, and in 1995 his experimental documentary made with Tony Steyger on artificial languages was broadcast on Channel 4 TV.
More recently his work has looked at new forms of narrative, in such works as Love Under Mercury, his first film for the cinema, which won a prize at the Ann Arbor film festival, and Amen ICA Cinema 2002, a palindromic video which won the prize for most original video at the Vancouver Videopoem festival.
He has explored issues around the impact of new technologies on narrative. Yarn 2011, uses the DVD medium to create a never ending story, and Actor 2013 makes film without a camera by putting the performer in a motion capture suit.
Manchester Time Machine 2012, made with the North West Film Archive is the first ever iPhone app to combine archive film footage and GPS and is part of a project looking at the nature of the city, including Not to Scale 2009 (filmed in a series of model towns). The video installation with Tony Steyger Stranger than Known; South Home Town 2014-15 filmed in Southampton continues this body of work.
Calling Blighty, a project with the North West Film Archive funded by the BFI in conjunction with HOME Manchester unites the descendants of a unique set of films from the second world war with the original films themselves.
He is co-editing a book for Intellect, Imaging the City – art, creative practices and media speculations, for publication 2016.
Projects
1. Imaging the City – art, creative practices and media speculations 2016
Co-edited book with Kevin O’Brien, Edward Clift, Graham Cairns. Intellect Books publishing date 2016. Details…
2. Message Home (with Marion Hewitt)2015
Calling Blighty is a series of short films made in 1944-45 of individual servicemen and women in the Far East sending personal messages home to their family and friends. These poignant filmed messages were shown in local cinemas, to the mixed laughter and tears of the specially invited audiences. Details…
3. South Home Town 2015 (with Tony Steyger)
A film about a city on the South coast of England. The Southampton of the imagination is known more for those who have left the city than those who stay. Details…
4. Actor 2013
A work which investigates the narrative possibilities of the motion capture suit, part of an ongoing investigation of the implications of new technologies for meaning in the moving image. The MoCap suit captures an actor’s performance without a camera, into a computer programme, from which both the physical appearance of the character and the camera movements can be later generated by the filmmaker. Details…
5. Manchester Time Machine 2012 (with Marion Hewitt)
This is the world’s first iPhone app to combine archive film with GPS to create a mobile way of accessing film in the location it was shot. This was a three way collaboration between Marion Hewitt, Director of the North West Film Archive, Dr. Details…
6. Yarn 2010
Yarn is the practice based output from a body of enquiry that looks at how new technologies can influence narrative theory and practice. The film uses the DVD medium to present scenes, voiceover and atmos sound at random, to create a kind of 1001 Nights endless narrative, whilst still retaining narrative coherence. Details…
Research
Exhibitions
Hawley, S., Steyger, T., 2015. Stranger than Known; South Home Town, Solent Showcase Gallery, 12/2015 - 1/2015.
Dutton, S., 2014. Possession (II), Lanchester Gallery Coventry, 14/3/2014 - 13/4/2014.
Hawley, S., 2013. Actor, Bangkok Arts and Culltural Centre 2013.
Hawley, S. Shaw, A., 2013. ‘SEAMLESS The Digital in Design’, MAO, National Museum of Design and Architecture Ljubljana, Slovenia,, 19 September to 3 November 2013.
Hawley, S., 2010. Yarn, Australian International Experimental Video Festival, Melbourne 2010.
Hawley, S., 2009. Not to Scale, Bloc Artspace 2008, Lanchester Gallery Coventry 2009, Istanbul Biennale 2009.
Artefacts
Hawley, S., 2016. 'War Memorial', Sheffield.
Hawley, S., 2015. 'A Message Home/Calling Blighty. NB see also War memorial (film) and War Memorial journal article', Manchester.
Hawley, S., Steyger, T., 2015. 'South Home Town 2015', New York.
Hawley, S., 2012. 'Manchester Time Machine', The first iPhone app to combine archive film footage with GPS, n/a.
Books
de Bruyn, D., Joris, E., Eeckhout, R., Chaparro, I., Zissovici, J., O'Brien, K., Vitaglione, S., Maruszczak, JP., Connah, R., Gomez Flores, L., Wilson, S., Smith, C., Flaxton, T., Singer, J., Bird, L., Jemtrud, M., Stankovic, J., 2016. 'Imaging the city;art, creative practices and media speculations', Intellect.
Hawley, S., 2003. 'Des Ecoles d'Art en Europe', L'Association des Ecoles Superieures d'Art de Bretagne.
Internet Publications
Hawley, S., 2015. '"It hasn't gelled: it hasn't taken on". The Family Way in the 1960s.', https://60sbritishcinema.wordpress.com/2015/11/30/it-hasnt-gelled-it-hasnt-taken-on-the-family-way-in-the-1960s/.
Hawley, S., 2013. 'Motion Capture; the inner life of the marionette. featuring Actor 2013', Animation Studies 2.0, http://blog.animationstudies.org/?p=521.
Conference Papers
Hawley, S., 2015. 'South Home Town; film and the imaginary city', Brighton Writes, 29/5/2015 - 29/5/2015.
Hawley, S., 2015. 'Stranger than Known; the imagined city', URBAN MEDIA STUDIES: CONCERNS, INTERSECTIONS AND CHALLENGES, Zagreb, 24/9/2015 - 25/9/2015.
Presentations
Hawley, S., 2015. 'Manchester as a mythical city', Manchester as a mythical city, Manchester City Art Gallery, Thursday 24th January 2012.
Hawley, S., 2015. 'Minutopia and the English Model Village', Scale' (SLSAeu), Valetta, Malta,, 2015, 15-18 June.
Hawley, S., 2015. 'South Home Town; film and the imaginary city', Place-Based Arts: Brighton Writes, University of Brighton, 29th May 2015.
Hawley, S., 2015. 'The Archive as Art,', Digital Echoes 2014, Coventry University., 8th Jan 2014.
Hawley, S., 2014. 'Locative narrative and an iPhone app; Manchester as a mythical city.', The Mediated City ., Ravensbourne University.London, 1st to 3rd April 2014.
Hawley, S., 2014. 'Manchester as a Mythical City; representations in film, the novel and new media. Conference paper.', The Mediated City, Woodbury University Los Angeles., 1st to 4th October 2014.
Hawley, S., 2014. 'Narrative, Cinema, and the Gallery.', White Cube/Dark Cube, Experimental Cinema and the gallery, Canterbury Christ Church University., 18 Feb 2014..
Hawley, S., 2005. 'Video Art from the Margins to the Mainstream; the early years', Video Art from the Margins to the Mainstream, Tate Britain, 3rd December 2005.
Other Outputs
Hawley, S., 2007. 'Barnum Effect', HD video installation and single screen piece.
Hawley, S., Dutton, S., 2005. 'Similar to Nothing', Art video.
Hawley, S., 2004. 'Speech Marks', DVD video.
Hawley, S., 2004. 'The King of Karanga', One minute art video.
Hawley, S., 2003. 'No Lyn, not on nylon', One minute video 2003 EUROSCREEN 21. Video, part of pan European Euroscreen 21Commissions from 21 artists. Forum of Art, Emmerich, Germany. Fournos Centre Athens, many other venues in Europe. Internet evidence..
Hawley, S., 2002. 'Amen ICA Cinema', 10 minute video, funded by Lovebytes (£6000) and the Studio of the North commissioned from open submission as a "digital short"..
Hawley, S., 2001. '5 Palindromic Loops', Video 1 min, projected on Gallery window to be seen in HoxtSquare. Part of curated group screening (50 artists, including Isaac Julien, etc.).
Hawley, S., 2001. 'Love Under Mercury', 35 min 16mm experimental film. Part of an ongoing series ofworks exploring the boundaries between documentary, fiction and pure film..
Hawley, S., 2001. 'Province', Group exhibition with 4 Sheffield & 5 Bilbao artists, exploring the post industrial city. Show quoted in the Guardian discussing opening. Part Funded by British Council Acciones Integradas Scheme (£5,000)..