>>REVIEW
WINNIPEG BABYSITTER
Daniel Barrow
EMMEDIA Gallery & Production Society
From the Torrington gopher museum and the giant Pysanka Easter egg in Vegreville, to Vulcan, Alberta's civic Star Trek obsession, the prairie sensibility combines equal parts ingenuity, survival and kitsch.
A Winnipeg version of this quirky prairie esthetic can be found in Daniel Barrow's archive/curatorial project Winnipeg Babysitter that collects and re-presents footage from the city's public access television. It was part of the CRTC's mandate through the ’80s and ’90s to provide opportunities for the public to utilize the medium of television. Many people used the rare chance to create their own puppet shows, play or provide commentary on popular music, create off-the-wall vignettes, or simply get their ideas on video and in front of an audience.
The city's "golden age" of public access was an era of wacky do-it-yourself, lo-fi video projects made by local residents, artists and personalities, broadcast on the Videon television station. The archive of indie tapes was destroyed by cable conglomerates in the mid-’90s, but Barrow has sourced out, tracked down and archived many of the surviving tapes for this project.
While he screened the program of just under 20 short selections, Barrow provided footnotes for the audience to read via overhead projector to the left of the screen. This is a natural combination of video screening with his well-known manual animation performances that also use the projector and have steadily gained fans over the course of the last several years.
The videos in Barrow's selection refer to prairie mythologies, local landmarks, stories, characters and the people behind the most loved public access shows, who often became local celebrities. His notes follow the onscreen events and dish the details and the dirt accordingly. As residents, it was important to reference the local, and yet many of the quirky stars choose to conceal their identities. It seems that the lure of self-determined expression on TV was, for some, tempered by a fear of being recognized doing something completely absurd. As such, sunglasses, hats, ski masks and Halloween masks were popular props – one guy even dons a fern held in place on his head with string and tape.
Without Barrow's big reveal, we might never know who these people actually are, and it's rumoured that show hosts even hid these elaborate on-air disguises from their parents and friends. Even though Videon wasn't a forum for contemporary art, Guy Maddin was one artist behind a mask in the slightly-fanatical series called Survival. The show had to post a "declaration of satire" as a disclaimer, just in case someone out in TV land took their detailed instructions on how to stock a bomb shelter or musings about life after apocalypse too seriously. He's since made it big with The Saddest Music in the World and Sissy Boy Slap Party.
Then there are the sock puppets who have a heavy metal band and share the slot with the hosts of Metal Inquisition. These characters play off each other as the tough-ass and sissy boy who sit around and quote from the "Text of the Heavy" and "The Pink Book of Wimpery."
Cosmopolitan Time is by far Barrow's most fascinating choice, with its backstory of Louise and Marion, two German women who immigrated together to Canada. The weekly show featured their gingham-bedecked band, the Cosmopolitans, with Louise on keys and Marion on drums. The show’s footage cuts between their new arrangements of "The Tennesee Waltz," singalongs with the live studio audience at the old folks’ home and gorgeous video pans of flowers sitting atop Louise's piano while music drifts in the background. As Marion gazes sweetly towards Louise during their rendition of "You Are My Sunshine," it's not a stretch to imagine the lesbian subtext that Barrow's scrolling projector notes later reveal.
Here the background stories seem as if they are fanciful elaborations on the true stories of the people behind Barrow’s collection of public access shows. But this queer re-reading of Cosmopolitan Time proves to be completely true. Barrow confirms that the two lived happily together for several decades and were closeted until he was given permission to include their true story as part of his performance.
Other notable videos are Magic Mike's Castle, with its corny anti-drug song, "Cooking with Fran," where she apologizes for a lacklustre recipe, and What's New Pussycat, featuring members of the Manitoba Cat Club all holding look-alike-ish white felines.
Winnipeg Babysitter is another strong example of EMMEDIA's support for consistently quirky, experimental work of local and national artists alike. Upcoming spring things include Digital Sugar Cubed and a celebration of EMMEDIA's 25th anniversary with the artists who have helped to build their incredible legacy as one of Calgary's fine media centres. For a quick fix this weekend, there's also the monthly performance and music series by Summerwood Warren, featuring everything cave-like – the Spelunking Show is complete with faux stalactites hanging from the ceiling and performances by local Calgary artists Consonant C, Woodpidgeon, Jane Vain, Morgan Greenwood, Latifa Pelletier-Ahmed and Danielle Gotell. The Spelunking Show runs this Friday, March 23 in the EMMEDIA screening room. |
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