In Process
Connective, intimate, and practical conversations with emerging artists and their creative practices. In Process is a show dedicated to supporting new artists and sharing their experiences of navigating the art world. It's rooted in the belief that artists are stronger, more creative, and more intelligent in community than in competition.
In Process
indexthumb: Dancing with Images
Surprise! We perform a switcheroo with Willow a.k.a. indexthumb landing in the hot seat this episode, as longtime collaborator Freddy Avis/Arswain takes the interviewing reins. In this one-off episode, Willow reveals their journey from narrative filmmaking to video installation and movement performance, following a pivotal MA degree in Artist Film and Moving Image at Goldsmiths University in 2024.
Starting with their initial inspirations of slapstick comedy, Willow recounts their first encounters with the camera, all the way up to their contemporary fascination with perception, dance, and the ways in which images and bodies produce each other reciprocally. Touching on everything from perceptual processes to trans experience and the politics of art, this is a wide-ranging conversation guided masterfully by Freddy that will be particularly useful for filmmakers seeking to broaden their practice beyond the narrative tradition.
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Artist Biography
indexthumb (British, London-based, they/them) is a visual artist working with moving image, performance and photography. Their multimedia video installations explore queer embodiment, invisibility, and the increasing tension between physical and virtual space. Centering their trans+ body as a phenomenological site of inquiry, they combine spontaneous composition with kinetic editing and visual effects to uncover the perceptual processes by which we constitute modern, frame-based selfhood.
IG Handles
Show: @inprocess__show
Willow: @indexthumb
Arswain: @arswain__
Texts & Links
indexthumb website
Ghosts of My Life by Mark Fisher
On Photography by Susan Sontag
The Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard
Timestamps
00:00 Introduction
01:52 Initial inspirations
04:54 Willow's First Film
09:36 Preserving creative rawness
15:09 Living in Berlin
17:45 Video installation: Commute
24:50 Transitions in gender and practice
27:40 Starting to dance
31:30 Misconceptions about dance
34:50 Decision to do an MA
41:00 Masculinity and biography in Call on Me, Me, Me
46:11 Disorientation and climate narrative in Today I Saved the World
50:41 Pressure to incorporate politics
57:11 Solace in community
64:00 SMELTING