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The Magnetic Memories project began in late 2015 when Charlie came back into contact with a film he made on VHS with a friend when he was 14.
Watching it again, he was struck by the gulf between what he remembered was on the tape and what he saw.
He began a trawl for other unique moments on videotape by offering to digitise publicly submitted footage for free — in exchange for permission to use images from the content to create new artworks.
Via a social media campaign and word of mouth, extraordinary memories began to appear on ageing cassettes...
6 layer screenprint on 400 gsm black paper
45 x 57 cm | edition of 20
£165 (unframed) / £255 (framed)
A burst of pink fuzz while Danielle's father was pointing his camcorder at the sky outside his suburban bungalow.
[Full story after next image]
6 layer screenprint on black paper
45 x 57 cm | edition of 20
£165 (unframed) / £255 (framed)
Danielle was born in Reno, Nevada to an English mother and an American father. When Danielle was five years old, her parents separated. Her mother took her to her native South London where they started again.
Every summer holiday, Danielle would be put on a plane to Reno where she’d stay with her dad.
After her father passed away in 2003, Danielle’s half-brother — a video technician from the University of Texas — gave her a 1hr45 minute videotape which he edited together from all the summers that Danielle spent with her father from 1986 to 1994 — a sort of home-movie 'Boyhood'.
“[My father was] really into photography and filming... I think he became slightly obsessed in having a daughter, especially one that was taken away from him. He left his first wife and 2 boys so really clung onto me and my Mum — which is ultimately why my mum had to get divorced. He was very possessive and jealous. I wasn't aware of all this of course...”
6 layer screenprint on black paper
45 x 57 cm | edition of 20
£165 (unframed) / £255 (framed)
The candid nature of some of the footage submitted to the Magnetic Memories Project was sometimes unsettling, since it raised the issue that not everyone captured on these tapes could have consented to the material being submitted.
(continued after next image)
Digital video from VHS
02:20
Short video from a particularly compelling sequence of the videotape submitted by Danielle. This would later inform a plethora of prints for the MM project...