Red WharfFilm and Video

Clive Walley

Although the greater part of Clive’s reputation is derived from his film-making the better part of his inspiration, even for films, is from painting. Between the production of the films mentioned above and during the main film-making period of his creative life, the 80’s and 90’s, he continued to make paintings and to show them. The films are a development from this interest in painting, to him more a way of continuing to paint, than a way of making films.
In order to bring the values of painting to the cinema and TV screen Clive created an unusual animation technique using oils and paints on layers of glass. This provided a way of transferring the sensuous qualities and the working practices of painting directly to the screen. Later, when the special 4D rig was being developed, he finally began to explore the combination of photography and painting as a sort of hybrid medium, but in the beginning there was no intention to let photography have any great effect on the direct result of moving, two-dimensional, paint on the screen.

To read about and view Clive's recent gallery intsallations
Select the link below
Installations
Collaborations with Michael Bennet

There also two DVDs available, one being a selection of Clive's films simply entitled Clive Walley and the other being a double DVD where
Clive gives an in-depth dialogue relating and prior to, each of his films, the DVD is entitled In conversation with Clive Walley.
Select the title links for further details

 

 

 


 

Clive Walley  

 

Y Rhaeadr
 
 
 
~ excerpt ~
 
 

As a result of his previous reputation with the Welsh Arts Council, Clive was asked to make a short film for S4C, the then new Welsh Channel 4. Y Rhaeadr is a five minute film about the making of a landscape painting.

 

Back to the top

Quartet
 
 
 
Prelude~ excerpt ~
Adagio~ excerpt ~
 
       
 
 
 
Caprice~ excerpt ~
Finale~ excerpt ~
 
       

After the modest success of the Waterfall film it became possible to pitch for more TV commissioned moving-paint films. Channel 4 and S4C commissioned the Quartet in 1987 and immediately the first film Prelude won the Rank Award for Best Production on Film at the Celtic Film Festival 1988.
Classical quartet form was the musical starting point which was combined with a desire to experiment with the relationships between music and painting, and between paint and illustration.

It was seen on Channel 4 and S4C as a full length TV programme scheduled for a wide viewing public

Back to the top

And Now You
 
 
 
~ excerpt ~
 
 

With the help of his engineering knowledge Clive designed and built a new-concept 4D multi-plane rostrum rig which introduced the effect of infinite forward and reverse camera moves. And Now You (1991) was the first film to be made on it, although there was still not enough money to finish the camera traverses on the top before starting work. Consequently the film makes emphatic use of the one effect which was operational, the one for which the new system was intended anyway, moving endlessly into and out of, the painted “tunnels” in front of the camera.
It is about the confinement of the imagination and looks a little like a computer game.

For its originality this new machine earned its own individual award. An Invention in Industry Award from the National Eisteddfod of Wales was granted for the rig in 1990.

In 1992 Clive Walley films occupied a whole 4-Mations half hour programme on Channel 4

 

Back to the top

Divertmenti
 
 
 
Winds and Changes~ excerpt ~
Love Song~ excerpt ~
Brushwork~ excerpt ~
 
 
 
 
 
 
Life Study~ excerpt ~
Slap Stick~ excerpt ~
Dark Matter~ excerpt ~
 
 
 

Finished in 1994 'Divertimenti' is a unique and beautiful sequence of films where the viewer is taken on a journey into a 4-dimensional abstract and painterly world, where animated brush strokes dance and dart across levels of glass in perfect synchrony with the music. Mostly appearing as abstract shapes and lines, occasionally the paint takes on other forms, metamorphosing into human and pictorial images. The Divertimenti is a sequence of six three minute films made in three intensive years of work with six different composers. A new composer for each film helped to ensure the variety in the series which is now its hall mark.

The “rig” had now got its camera moves fitted to the top and the series is also an exploration of the creative domain that opened up. “The Divertimenti” has been widely exhibited in festivals, galleries and on TV.

The films were first seen on TV embedded in a BBC2 program called Space, Time and Paint in 1998, which included footage about the process used to make them.

'The Divertimenti' collected a total of six awards, including the Experimental Film Award at Ottawa.

The Divertimenti and the artist are the subject of an extended interview with David Erhlich in Animation Journal March 1999 USA.

In the same year (1995) the Irish Animation Festival hosted a Clive Walley Retrospective.

Back to the top

Light of Uncertainty
 
 
 
~ excerpt ~
 
 

Using the methods developed in the making of the Divertimenti (plus back-projection), Clive made a new ambitious piece for BBC2 and S4C. It was about the use the modern spirit might make of the seventy five year old news from quantum physics, and for the first time made use of specially shot live action material back projected into the multi-plane image.

In March1998. National Film Theatre. Light of Uncertainty, won Best Film at the Cutting Edge at the British Animation Awards. It was nominated for an award at Bradford Animation Festival in the category “Professional” and appeared at several prestigious International film festivals where the previous work was already well known.

It has appeared twice on BBC2; once on its own, and once as part of “5 films by Clive Walley” along with four of the previous series.

It won Best Animation at Avanca, Portugal.

It is the subject of a long article in Filmwaves No.6.

In 2005-6 the film and some of the associated art-work was included in “Space-Tricks” – Zurich and tour.

 

Back to the top

A470 (Measuring Wales)
 
 
 
~ excerpt ~
 
  An Art commission for the Mostyn Art Gallery for tour to Chapter Arts Centre in Cardiff. An interactive digital Concept-art piece, it was included in a show called “A470”. The visitor to the show could drive themselves down the whole length of the A470, the main route down the length of Wales, at any speed up to that of the RAF jets which are often seen in the skies over Wales. It was immensely popular at both venues arousing much interest in the public and media. It was revived in order to be featured in the exhibition area of the Millenium Centre in Cardiff as part of its opening festivities.  

Back to the top

Adagio
 
 
 
~ excerpt ~
 
 

A four minute film, in which the landscape is inhabited by the imagination. Clive always planned to make a trilogy of films, with a classical musical form, which dealt with the spiritual implications of the major intellectual movements of the present time, as identified by him.

Light of Uncertainty was the first of these three pieces and indicated his sense of the serious work animation-as-art might aspire to. Unfortunately this “last project” was never realised in its proper form, and this Adagio is a replacement for a more ambitious film would have taken the central place in the final trilogy. It uses the medium of moving paint to suggest the thought processes of the viewer contemplating Nature.

 

Back to the top

 
Short Shorts
 
 
 
 
Tai-Chi
 

Back to the top

 
Tea Cup
Particles
 
 
 
 

~ excerpt ~

“The Teacup” a solo exhibition in “Five”, a new gallery near Brick Lane in London, which showed one of a set of works made by the artist for distribution on DVD or for show in art spaces. It is called “The Teacup – sixteen watercolours on Bockingford paper”. It brings extra dimensionality to the traditional medium of watercolour painting by a simple engagement with digital techniques. The exhibition also included a retrospective of work made by the artist for TV and the international festival circuit over the previous 10 years.

~ excerpt ~
 

Back to the top

Adverts ~ Commercials
 

'Sephora'
advert ~ excerpt ~

 
  TV Commercial for Procter & Gamble – Silver World medal, New York Film & Television Advertising Awards and a nominee at the British Animation Awards for Best Advert 2000.
TV Commercial for the Aim Investment Fund
TV advert for major USA retailer
 

 

MTV Channel Ident
 
 
 
'MTV Channel Ident'
~ excerpt ~
 
     

Back to the top

Clive Walley ~ DVDs

Clive Walley

A selection of Clive's films ... capturing painted brushstrokes in his unique three dimensional fine art animation


1 ~ Y Rhaeadr: Music by Neil Ardley

2 ~ Quartet: Music by Alfred Tubb, Edit by Meirion Evans
      Prelude
      Adagio
      Caprice
      Finale

3 ~ And Now You: Sound by Bryn Jones

4 ~ The Divertimenti:
      Winds and Changes: Music by Janine Swinhoe
      Love Song: Music by Dave Usher
      Brush Work: Music by Ian Mellish
      Life Study: Music by Jochen Eisentraut
      Slap Stick: Sound by Bryn Jones and Graham Bowers
      Dark Matter: Music by Rodney Newton

5 ~ Light of Uncertainty: Sound Design by Jochen Eisentraut.
      Actors: Geoff Elliot, Branwen Lisa

6 ~ Adagio: Music by Jochen Eisentraut

7 ~ A470 (Measuring Wales)

(Total running time 1hr 33min 36sec)

To purchase this unique DVD please click here

The purchase price is £20.00 plus postage

Clive Walley ~ Films

Back to the top

In conversation with Clive Walley

Clive talks about his life, from his early days to
the present. How and where his interest in the arts
and his unique approach to animation originated,
explaining his ideas, motives, production values
and funding for each project and film.

An informal interview with Graham Bowers at the Red Wharf Studio ~ Spring 2008

In chronological order (from the conversation)

Volume 1:
Y Rhaeadr: Music by Neil Ardley
Quartet: Music by Alfred Tubb, Edit by Meirion Evans
~ Prelude
~ Adagio
~ Caprice
~ Finale
And Now You: Sound by Bryn Jones
The Divertimenti:
~ Winds and Changes: Music by Janine Swinhoe
~ Love Song: Music by Dave Usher
~ Brush Work: Music by Ian Mellish
~ Life Study: Music by Jochen Eisentraut
~ Slap Stick: Sound by Bryn Jones and Graham Bowers
~ Dark Matter: Music by Rodney Newton

(Total running time 2hrs 6min 1sec)

Volume 2:
Light of Uncertainty: Sound Design by Jochen Eisentraut.
Actors: Geoff Elliot, Branwen Lisa
Adagio: Music by Jochen Eisentraut
MTV: Music by Graham Bowers
Adverts: Agency ~ Bermuda Shorts
Short Shorts:
~ Tai Chi: Sound by Graham Bowers
~ Hoffmann: Music by Graham Bowers
A470 (Measuring Wales)

(Total running time 1hr 55min 44sec)

Clive_300

To purchase this unique and informative double DVD containing Clive's films, each preceded by interesting dialogue regarding their making, please click here.

The purchase price is £30.00 plus postage


 

Back to the top

 

Select the Links below to view details of Clive and his work