User:Trflaxton
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Terry Flaxton is a British video artist. Born in the United Kingdom and initially studying sound, Flaxton initially addressed photographic concerns before taking up video as a practice.
[edit] 1970s
Flaxton, Penny Dedman and Antony Cooper formed Vida around the beginning of 1977 and made various works including The Fashion Show, Inside Comics, Presentiments and Talking Heads which won Fourth Prize in the 1979 Tokyo Video Festival. From 1978 to 1980 Vida organised 170 screenings of their work initially around the UK before screening work at the Downtown Video Collective in New York and the Bay Area Video Coalition in San Francisco. They also made some work for VideoWest which was transmitted out of San Francisco and picked up by KABC in LA and WTTW in Chicago. All three artists were active in London Video Arts, an artists video collective and Flaxton curated various shows at both the Air and Acme Galleries in London before co-organising the First National Independent Video Festival at the Film Co-op in London in 1981.
[edit] 1980s
Around the end of 1981 Flaxton formed Triple Vision with Penny Dedman and Kez Cary and this grouping made various documentaries and fictions funded by the Greater London Arts Association and various trade unions including NUPE, NALGO, COHSE, the Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom and other organisations such as the Greater London Council. Triple Vision received 5 Grierson nominations for their documentary work during this period. Eventually Triple Vision were approached by the fledgling Channel 4 to purchase some work and broadcast it and with the addition of Renny Bartlett and the loss of Kez Cary this new contact brought about the influential 'On Video' a three part series on the state of British Video Art (until 1986). Triple Vision had a retrospective of their work at the Mill Valley Film Festival in 1986. Later they were commissioned to make On Video 4 and 5 on the State of European Video Art (until 1988). Triple Vision were influential in their documentary making and made several ground breaking documentaries including The State of Europe, The Cold War Game: The USA and The USSR, Intensive Care (on the UK Health System) and Animal Rights, Animal Wrongs.
Throughout this period Flaxton had a growing a reputation as both a Director of Photography (shooting the first Beta Video to Film project for Channel 4's Out of Order, 1987 receiving a Prix Italia nomination) and also as as an artist as he made work which earned him commissions and festival screenings and premiers at major festivals around the world. By 1992 Triple Vision had ended its run and Flaxton spent the 1990s making work which culminated in Skin Deep, a drama which he wrote, lit, directed and edited. This received a £50000 production award and was screening on the UK's Commercial Channel. Flaxton formed Ignition Films in 1999 and this company produces High Definition works of drama, documentary and art. In 2005 Flaxton was given a retrospective at the 2005 InVideo Festival in Milan where The Dinner Party, an installation was shown to great acclaim.
