Terry Flaxton

Racism on a British Army Base is making life hell for Charlie, a newly-promoted black corporal. He has been keeping his head down, but now he can no longer avoid taking action. A mythic battle commences.

Voiced by Jonathan Pryce, Terry Flaxton’s The World Within Us is a lyrical meditation set inside the mind of a dying writer. Combining original poetry with early digital imagery, the film weaves memory, art, and mortality into a haunting reflection on life’s inner landscapes.

’25 years ago I was asked by Chiatt Day Advertising in Los Angeles to cover the making of ‘1984’ for Apple Computers. This commercial was to be directed by Ridley Scott to introduce the Macintosh to the world. ... The message of the whole enterprise was: ‘If you miss this, then you’re going to be at a disadvantage’. This sentiment in itself set the tone for the definition of the self at the end of the 20th century, when the self was to be defined by its likes and its dislikes. Prisoners as a work derived from the footage shot during the making of the commercial deals with the problem of ideology, the potential manipulation of meaning and the hotness or coldness of the medium as expressed by McLuhan as well as several other issues. ... So therefore those people depicted in my work, the capitalists, the neo-Nazis, Thatcherites , communists, corporatists and us the anarchists video crew, were all held Prisoner by our own set of beliefs.’ – Terry Flaxton

Having created a set of works on analogue video between 1976 and 1980 we (Vida) decided to go to America to drive across the dream of America in search of the source of intuition. The US had provided not only Americans but people around the world - such as we three British people - with a promise of improvement, not only of our circumstance, but of ourselves. As a sometimes musician, poet, writer and painter I’d become familiar with the use of improvisation to create various artefacts and moments and recognised that element when constructing moving images on a timeline into an act of durational statement.

Racism on a British Army Base is making life hell for Charlie, a newly-promoted black corporal. He has been keeping his head down, but now he can no longer avoid taking action. A mythic battle commences.

Racism on a British Army Base is making life hell for Charlie, a newly-promoted black corporal. He has been keeping his head down, but now he can no longer avoid taking action. A mythic battle commences.

Voiced by Jonathan Pryce, Terry Flaxton’s The World Within Us is a lyrical meditation set inside the mind of a dying writer. Combining original poetry with early digital imagery, the film weaves memory, art, and mortality into a haunting reflection on life’s inner landscapes.

Voiced by Jonathan Pryce, Terry Flaxton’s The World Within Us is a lyrical meditation set inside the mind of a dying writer. Combining original poetry with early digital imagery, the film weaves memory, art, and mortality into a haunting reflection on life’s inner landscapes.

’25 years ago I was asked by Chiatt Day Advertising in Los Angeles to cover the making of ‘1984’ for Apple Computers. This commercial was to be directed by Ridley Scott to introduce the Macintosh to the world. ... The message of the whole enterprise was: ‘If you miss this, then you’re going to be at a disadvantage’. This sentiment in itself set the tone for the definition of the self at the end of the 20th century, when the self was to be defined by its likes and its dislikes. Prisoners as a work derived from the footage shot during the making of the commercial deals with the problem of ideology, the potential manipulation of meaning and the hotness or coldness of the medium as expressed by McLuhan as well as several other issues. ... So therefore those people depicted in my work, the capitalists, the neo-Nazis, Thatcherites , communists, corporatists and us the anarchists video crew, were all held Prisoner by our own set of beliefs.’ – Terry Flaxton

Having created a set of works on analogue video between 1976 and 1980 we (Vida) decided to go to America to drive across the dream of America in search of the source of intuition. The US had provided not only Americans but people around the world - such as we three British people - with a promise of improvement, not only of our circumstance, but of ourselves. As a sometimes musician, poet, writer and painter I’d become familiar with the use of improvisation to create various artefacts and moments and recognised that element when constructing moving images on a timeline into an act of durational statement.