Friday Focus - In conversation with Tom Walker and Matthew Arthur Williams
In this online talk, join artists Tom Walker and Matthew Arthur Williams in conversation with Hunterian Curator Dominic Paterson, as they explore their encounters with the work of Derek Jarman, and the role archives and queer histories play in their practice.
Date: Friday 21 February 2025
Time: 13:00 - 13:30
Venue: Online
Category: Hunterian
Digging in Another Time: Derek Jarman’s Modern Nature is inspired by Jarman’s diary entries from 1989 which detail his performance-installation at Glasgow’s Third Eye Centre, his planting of his acclaimed garden at Prospect Cottage, Dungeness and his work on the film The Garden.
Alongside works by Jarman, the exhibition features the work of six contemporary artists: Andrew Black, Luke Fowler, Jade de Montserrat, Tom Walker, Matthew Arthur Williams and Sarah Wood. Some of these contemporary works make specific references to Jarman, while others explore themes in his practice more obliquely. Together they continue a conversation with Jarman in which his works remain open and active participants, some 30 years after the artist’s death.
In this online talk, join artists Tom Walker and Matthew Arthur Williams in conversation with Hunterian Curator Dominic Paterson, as they explore their encounters with Jarman, and the role archives and queer histories play in their practice.
Artist Biographies
Tom Walker lives and works in Leeds. A graduate of the MFA programme at the Ruskin School of Art, Oxford, Walker engaged with the archiving of Derek Jarman’s work during a 2017 Creative Lab residency at CCA Glasgow. This was part of his larger project of investigating the differing modes of organisation and presentation at work within counter and queer culture in post-Stonewall society, examining political and aesthetic responses to both times of crisis and celebration.
Matthew Arthur Williams is an artist, photographer and DJ living and working in Glasgow. He completed his BA Photography at Manchester Metropolitan University in 2012. Williams frequently works with installations incorporating the photographic medium, moving image and sound. He was awarded the Ampersand/Photoworks Fellowship in February 2024 and nominated for Film London Jarman Award in 2023. He sits on the board of trustees for The Bothy Project and is Lecturer in Fine Art Photography at the Glasgow School of Art.
Friday Focus is an online talks series hosted by The Hunterian, University of Glasgow. Each session features a different speaker, sharing a deeper insight into our exhibitions and collections, research and work going on behind the scenes at The Hunterian.
The talks take place at 1pm over Zoom, and are 25 minutes long with time for questions afterwards. Recordings of the sessions will be made available on our YouTube channel.