The Future Queen of the Screen

The to-date most extensive video by Englishwoman Helen Benigson, The Future of the Queen of the Screen, combines contrasting visual worlds: the South London borough of Peckham and panoramic views of the beaches of the Dead Sea alternate with a virtual desertscape. The main protagonists are two female hip-hop dancers who compete both in real and in fictitious dance competitions in the shape of avatars and upload their choreographies to an internet platform. This narrative montage is interrupted by sequences showing a woman adrift in the sea, an appearance by the artist herself.

Benigson’s video art is characterised by a complex visual language. Over-saturated colours and partially psychedelic elements are combined to form collage-like passages which blend impressions of nature with aggressive hip-hop gestures. What becomes particularly apparent here is the antagonism of 'wet and dry', accentuated by the lines of text and the sequence of images. On top of this, feminine attributes like the graduation of pink colouring in the shots, cross fading using larger than life sushi bites, rosebuds and also the female body are used in an aggressive fashion. The polemic interaction of image material, off commentary and musical accompaniment using rap by Beningson’s alter ego 'Princess Belsize Dollar' persistently evokes sexual connotations and provocatively draws on the treatment of female sexuality in the internet age. (Ann-Kathrin Täuber)

* We can only show an excerpt of this work in the online archive. For the complete version, please contact the artist.