Dancing in Peckham is a video work by Gillian Wearing (b. Birmingham, 1963) whose films and photographs explore our public personas and private lives. This Turner Prize winner’s remarkable works draw on fly-on-the-wall documentaries, reality TV and the techniques of theatre, to explore how we present ourselves to the world.
Shot in a southeast London shopping mall, Dancing in Peckham depicts the artist freely dancing alone, without headphones and unaccompanied by music. Wearing’s camera also positions passersby as unwitting participants in the performance.
The work, the artist herself dancing in a shopping mall, blissfully unaware of her bemused audience is an idea of performance that continues with works including Wearing’s 1997 masterpiece, 10–16. Adults lip synch the voices and act out the physical tics of seven children in a captivating film which moves from the breathless excitement of a ten year old to the existential angst of an adolescent.
Wearing’s portraits and mini-dramas reveal a paradox, given the chance to dress up, put on a mask or act out a role, the liberation of anonymity allows us to be more truly ourselves. Wearing’s work is both political – often focusing on the dispossessed or the traumatised – and poetic, finding the extraordinary in us all.w
Dancing in Peckham was part of the touring programme, UK/NY curated by Film and Video Umbrella. The programme was funded by Arts Council England.
