Showcased for the first time in Scotland, Kennedy Browne, a collaborative practice of Irish artists Gareth Kennedy and Sarah Browne, explore ways of temporarily occupying architectural fragments and cultural texts, merging ‘real’ with artificial, politics and kitsch. Two screenings will open with an artist talk and book launch at 5pm on Fri 31 January and the films will be shown again on Sat 1 February between 12pm – 7pm in CCA Cinema.

Katarzyna Kosmala will discuss with Kennedy Browne the production process of their script-based works and a political message behind the construction of myths. How Capital Moves is one of the works examined in her new book Imagining Masculinities.

How Capital Moves (2010) draws on an episode of relocation of a multinational company from Limerick, Ireland to Lodz, Poland. Concerned with interrogating the predilections of neo-liberal investment, using internet platforms, Kennedy Browne gathered anecdotes of redundancy, crafted into a script made up of 6 distinct monologues, each capturing different experiences and anxieties of working within The Company. The Myth of the Many in the One (2012) attempts to deconstruct masculine genius. To explore the cultural articulation of a leader, Kennedy Browne focused on the boyhood stories of high-tech industries leaders such as Bob Noyce, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs – presented as visionary entrepreneurs responsible for key developments in electronics and digital technologies.

Imagining Masculinities: Spatial and Temporal Representation and Visual Culture (2013, Routledge) will be launched during the event. Applying an international lens, the book investigates representations of men and masculinities in contemporary culture, and examples of visual art that deconstruct those representations.

Kennedy Browne have been working together in the medium of video and installation since 2005. They have exhibited internationally including USA, Egypt, Austria, France, Estonia, Switzerland, Italy, Poland, and Ireland.

Katarzyna Kosmala is Professor of Culture, Media and Visual Practice at the University of West of Scotland, art writer and freelance curator.