People Like Us, who is Vicki Bennett, creates audio-visual collage using sampling and found footage. These appropriated elements compose the arena where recontextualized sounds and images begin to take on new lives, giving way to multiple worlds of mirrored images. The result is a labyrinthine universe of alchemical mystery where equal measures of lighthearted humour and sinister satire create a balanced art. By using A/V elements from throughout the 20th C., Bennett paradoxically breathes new interpretations into our current relationship with technology. Her work is a delightful parody of both past and present European and American culture.

Biography

Beginning in 1992, Vicki Bennett has been making audio CDs, radio, and later A/V multimedia under the name People Like Us.

In 1999, Bennett earned a commission from Work and Leisure International in Manchester to create and perform a live set at Nottingham Now Festival, Hull TOOT (ROOT) Festival, as well as Manchester Green Room. Ever since she's been involved with animating her collages, employing witty recontextualization and revealing juxtaposition in conjunction with her own music compositions in a live environment.

Not content to stand still, Bennett again extended the scope of her work, creating two stand-alone movies, "We Edit Life" (commissioned by Lovebytes, Sheffield), and "The Remote Controller" (commissioned by Future Physical, London). Both investigate themes of working with new technology, paradoxically appropriating archive film footage from the 1930s through the 1980s. Among other things, these films demonstrate how technological updates can shape our perceptions of past and current culture. As a result, Bennett alchemically transforms the past into the present, unveiling the machinations which govern how technology changes our lives and portrays the illusion of progress. This is an ongoing and often self-referential theme in both the audio and the visual work.

In November 2003 she took part in a symposium at the Tate Modern called "Sample Culture Now", alongside Christian Marclay, Mark Leckey and two cultural theorists. This included a concert, a public address, plus a longer, more in depth question and answer panel session with the audience. More recently, she has performed her work in universities such as The Royal College of Art, San Francisco Art Institute and UC Davis in California, and played concerts at The ICA, The Queen Elisabeth Hall, The Purcell Room, The Tate Modern, The Pompidou Centre and The Walker Art Center (Minneapolis). Along with artists Ruth Jarman and Joseph Gerhardt, she hosted an audio collage workshop at Brighton Media Centre as part of the 'Year Of The Artist' scheme.

In late February/early March 2004 she took part in a residency at FACT in Liverpool, teaching audio collage to 10-12 year olds, making field recordings and working with radio archive material. This was in collaboration with a local school, and also the German artist Felix Knoth. Performances by the artists were also a part of the program. In April PLU performed at Toronto Images Festival and recorded a live session for BBC Radio 3;s "Mixing It".

Vicki has just finished a commission ("in site") with The Lux in London, a short film called Resemblage working with their archive of artists' films. Core footage comes from Stan Vanderbeek, Larry Jordan, Semiconductor and Alan Berliner. Lux will be making a special webpage for this film, but meanwhile it is available for viewing at The Internet Archive.

Presently Vicki is working on a film/installation commission with Sonic Arts Network of London, developing a touring gallery film/video piece called "Magic In The Air". This will be in collaboration with Prelinger Archives. "Magic In The Air" addresses early technology (of the 20th Century), but explains the process as if it were magic.

People Like Us recently released an online only album at Ubuweb. This furthers their feelings that circulation is more beneficial than conventional distribution, and that the gift economy reaps financial reward through this circulation and accompanying publicity.

In addition to this, she also does an ongoing weekly experimental arts radio show on the freeform New York radio station WFMU, called "DO or DIY" (currently taking time off).

This winter Vicki will be creating a new live set, as part of a Grants For Arts Bursary received from the Arts Council England, and performing as part of Christian Marclay's "Sounds of Christmas" installation at the Tate Modern.

Links

http://www.peoplelikeus.org - People Like Us website http://www.wfmu.org/playlists/PL - People Like Us weekly radio show on WFMU, NY/internet at wfmu.org http://www.peoplelikeus.org/plu-abridged.html - People Like Us's new online album Abridged Too Far http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/alt/johnpeel/features/peoplelikeus.shtml - feature on John Peel's BBC Radio 1 site on People LikeUs, including 2 video streams and interview April 2003 http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,56704,00.html - article on in Wired.com featuring PLU December 2002 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/entertainment/new_media/newsid_2062000/2062364.stm - article featuring media work of PLU on BBC site July 2002 http//www.bbc.co.uk/music/experimental/reviews/peoplelikeus_britannica.shtml - review of People Like Us album, Recyclopaedia Britannica, on BBC website 2002 http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,817495,00.html - small mention in The Guardian (UK) http://www.peoplelikeus.org/press.htm - Press pictures and film stills http://www.peoplelikeus.org/cuttings.htm - Press cuttings http://www.peoplelikeus.org/downloads/PLU Stifled.rm - realvideo clip of People Like Us http://www.peoplelikeus.org/weedit.htm - download a PLU digital short, We Edit Life, in mpg2 form 2003 http://www.lovebytes.org.uk/2002/ongoing.html#nc6 and http://www.lovebytes.org.uk/2002/docs/pages/vicki.htm - photo and text documentation of Lovebytes Commission for film "We Edit Life", 2002 http://www.lovebytes.org.uk/2002/docs/video.html - video documentation of PLU's Lovebytes Commission 2002 http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/world/mixingitmarch01.shtml or directly to the ram file at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/world/ram/wpeoplelikeus.ram - 4 minute video stream of performance for Radio 3’s Mixing It Spring 2001 http://www.thewire.co.uk/web/camera.html - Interference night of Plunderphonia at London Lux Centre – video stream (once again works better in netscape) February 2001 http://www.magnetic-south.org.uk/quiet - documentation of audio collage workshop residency at Brighton Library, in association with Brighton's Lighthouse, Summer 2001 http://www.Veejay-Nights.com/london/index.html - video interview with People Like Us, 2001 - in conjunction with the European Media Art Festival (EMAF) http://live.120seconds.com/001010_fcmm/tuesday_1_bennett.html - 50 minute video stream of People Like Us at Montreal Festival of New Cinema and New Media (FCMM) 1999

Selected Performances and Screenings

December 2004 - Participating with a live concert as part of Christian Marclay's Sounds of Christmas installation at the Tate Modern, London (18 December) October 2004 - Bath Michael Tippett Centre September 2004 - Barcelona LEM Festival August 2004 - Oslo Studio 04 Festival May 2004 BBC Radio 3 - Mixing It - Live Session/broadcast April 2002 Toronto Images Festival http://www.imagesfestival.com March 2004 Virginia Film Festival http://www.vafilm.com/php-bin/news/showArticle.php?id=251 March 2004 New York Underground Film Festival http://www.nyuff.com/ February 2004 First Anniversary of 2003 FACT, Liverpool January 2004 Screening at Rotterdam Film Festival November 2003 Sample Culture Now at The Tate Modern http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/eventseducation/sampleculture.htm October 2003 City of Women, International Festival of Contemporary Arts Ljubljana, Slovenia October 2003 Dissonanze Festiva of Electronic Music and Digital Art, at MACROl, Rome - September 2003 The Pompidou Centre, Paris July 2003 The ICA, London - screenings of The Remote Controller and We Edit Life as part of their Radical Entertainment season June 2003 Le Fresnoy, Studio National Des Arts Contemporains, France March 2003 POL Pol Festival, Frankfurt February 2003 Club Transmediale, Berlin at "Maria am Ostbahnhof" January 2003 Session for John Peel, for BBC Radio 1 November 2002 Avanto Festival at Kiasma Centre, Helsinki, Finland September 2002 Sound Unseen Festival at The Walker Center, Minneapolis, USA June 2002 South Bank's Meltdown Festival, Queen Elisabeth Hall, London - visuals for Baby Zizanie May 2002 South Bank's ETHER Festival, Purcell Room, London April 2002 US tour (New York, Portland, San Francisco and LA) December 2001 Dysfunktional Beats at 93ft East, London November 2001 Laptops Live at the ICA, London November 2001 Futuresonic, Manchester October 2001 Sydney Opera House, Australia June 2001 London Musicians’ Collective’s Tenth Annual Festival, Purcell Room, London June 2001 Sonar Festival, Barcelona – collaboration with Matmos (US) May 2001 Catalyst/Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival, Belfast April 2001 EMAF – Osnabreuck March 2001 Lovebytes Festival, Sheffield March 2001 Dingwalls, London in association with Mixing It, BBC Radio 3 February 2001 London Lux Cinema in association with The Wire magazine December 2000 Bristol Cube Cinema, in association with The Wire magazine December 2000 Lisbon Numero Festival in association with Warp Records of London November 2000 Burning Bush, Dundee Contemporary Arts October 2000 Montreal Festival of New Cinema and New Media (FCMM) May 2000 Brooklyn Experimental Music Festival, NYC April 2000 Brighton Komedia June 2000 TransEuropa 2000, Hildesheim March 2000 Exit Festival, Creteil June 2000 Sonar 2000, Barcelona February 2000 Brussels 2000, European City of Culture Festival January 2000 Chicago Underground Film Festival (CUFF) event October 1999 Fylkingen, Stockholm October 1999 Nottingham Expo Festival September 1999 Ars Electronica, Linz – collaboration with Negativland (US) August 1999 Festival of the Regions, Enns September 1996 Dutch Electronic Arts Festival (DEAF) at V2, Rotterdam

Workshops/Residencies/Commissions/Collaborations

Winter 2004-5 - Grants for Arts Commission from Arts Council England to make new live set Summer-Autumn 2004 - commission with Sonic Arts Network in London to make a short film installation called Magic in the Air Winter-Spring 2004 -commission withThe Lux in London, to make online film work utilising their archive, resulting in the short film Resemblage Ongoing Soundtrack/sound design for film by Rick Prelinger http://www.archive.org/movies/prelinger.php Summer 2002-Spring 2003 Future Physical commission to make video work The Remote Controller December-January 2002 Lovebytes commission to make a digital short film, We Edit Life, available here June 2001 YOTA residency at Brighton and Hove Music Library/Lighthouse, Brighton January-April 2001 YOTA residency at Hull Time Based Arts February 2001 Lecture/Forum, Dundee Contemporary Arts and Duncan of Jordanstone College February 2000 Music workshop, Nova Cinema, Brussels, in association with Brussels 2000 City of Culture celebrations October 2000 Presentation to school children, Fylkingen, Stockholm

Album/Single Releases - listen at [1]

"Another Kind of Humor Another Kind of Murder" (split with Abraxas) World Serpent/GBCD1/GB1 (CD/LP) 1992 * "Lowest Common Dominator" Staalplaat/STCD079 (CD) 1994 * "It’s Terrorific!" Staalplaat (DAT) 1994 * "Guide To Broadcasting" Staalplaat/STMDCD2 (3"CD) 1994 * "Beware The Whim Reaper" Staalplaat/STCD 101 (CD) 1996 * "Jumble Massive" Soleilmoon Recordings/SOLV005 (LP) 1996 * "File Under Easy Listening/File Under Sleazy Listening" (split with Sniper) Kleptones 1 (LP) 1996* "Lassie House" Staalplaat/STPLUPOO1 (10" Picture Disc) 1997 * "Blundersonix/Special Mix" (split with TFU) Kleptones 2 (LP) 1997 * "People Like Us and Sniper Play The Three DJs of The Apocalypse" (with Sniper) Kleptones 4 (LP) 1997 * "Hate People Like You" Staalplaat/STCD 119 (CD) 1997 * "People Like Us Meet The Jet Black Hair People In Concert" Audioview 005 (CD) 1999 * "Hate People Like Us" (remix of PLU by Coil, Negativland, Death in June, Barbed, Christoph Heemann, Bruce Gilbert, Stock, Hausen & Walkman, Rehberg & Bauer, Mika Vainio, Boyd Rice, Dummy Run, Farmer's Manual and Sons of Silence. 2CD features additionally Cyclobe, Req1, V/VM, Sniper, Mr Rotorvator, Felix Kubin, Xper. Xr, Venoz [TKS], Katy Brown and Dr P Li Khan. There was an additional remix by Andy Votel/Badly Drawn Boy, excluded for legal reasons. Caciocavallo/CAD1 (CD) and Staalplaat/STCD126 (2CD) 1999 2CD* "Thermos Explorer" Hot Air/Airhead002 (CD) 2000 "A Fistful of Knuckles" Caciocavallo/CAD10 (CD) 2000 "Swing Largo/Going Out Of My Town" Klang Galerie/GG30 (7") 2001 * "Home-Roam-Play/Work-All-Day" (split 12" with remix by Matmos) Wicked Witch Records (12") 2001 recalled due to faulty pressing * "Recyclopaedia Britannica" Mess Media/Mess 1 (CD) April 2002 "Preserved Cowgirl" Asphodel - remix of Tipsy (CD) August 2002 "Stifled Love" Mess Media/Mess 2 (12") October 2002 7" single on Rough Trade label For Us Records October 2002 * "Volatile Media" Lovebytes label (DVD) March 2003 "Wide Open Spaces" Tigerbeat6 label (CD) collaboration with Matmos and Wobbly May 2003 "Nothing Special" Mess03 (CD) collaboration with Kenny G "Abridged Too Far" - online album at Ubuweb. More info here "Windpipe Moods" - (CD) Mukow October 2004

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