Derek Jarman

“As I got to know him, I realized that it was his evident disregard for narrative and the conventions of dialogue-based storytelling that set him apart from his peers. His approach to filmmaking, which he developed relatively late in his artistic life, was more like that of a painter: he would position the camera and create a scene that unfolded continuously, without cuts or counterplots.” - James Mackay on Derek Jarman. Derek Jarman was a painter, writer, set designer, film director and queer rights activist. He studied at King's College London and then at the Slade School of Art. He was distinguished for his groundbreaking work in pop video in England, applying a subversive aesthetic and experimental approach to his films. Although low-budget, his films had a high visual and thematic impact. Among his most notable works are Jubilee, Sebastien, Caravaggio and The Last of England. In addition, music was a great inspiration for him; he worked on music videos for artists such as Marianne Faithfull and The Smiths, fusing his artistic vision with the pop culture of the 1980s. In 1986, Jarman was diagnosed with HIV and decided to make it public. He subsequently settled in Prospect Cottage, a small house on the Dungeness coast, where he cultivated a garden that reflected his vision of transforming pain into beauty and violence into hospitality. This period, along with the diaries he wrote there and his last film, Blue, can be seen as a kind of closure to his work, a farewell. Jarman's legacy, characterized by his creativity and political commitment, remains a source of inspiration for using art as a tool to challenge social norms and explore themes of identity and resistance.