Derek Jarman (1942-1994) is known as one of our most poetic and anarchic film-makers and artists, as well as a prominent gay rights activist. He started his career as a stage designer, working as Ken Russell’s production designer for “The Devils” 1971.
Art Fund needs to raise £3.5m by 31 March 2020 to purchase Jarman's Dungeness house, Prospect Cottage, and to establish a permanently funded programme to conserve and maintain the building, its contents and its garden for the future. More than 25 years after his death, Prospect Cottage continues to be a site of pilgrimage for people from all over the world who come to be inspired by its stark beauty a Jarman’s legacy. The cottage and its contents are now being sold following the death in 2018 of Keith Collins, Jarman’s close companion in his final years, to whom he bequeathed the cottage.
More than 3,000 people have donated to the Art Fund’s campaign to save Prospect Cottage in its first two weeks. Find out more and donate on the Art Fund website.
Book tickets for Glitterbug fundraising screening
To help with the cause to save Jarman's cottage, we're screening his 1993 film Glitterbug on Sunday 22 March at 4.30pm. The event will include a special introduction by Derek Brown, Art Director (The Garden).
100% of ticket sales for our Glitterbug screening will go to Art Fund to help secure Prospect Cottage and Jarman’s Legacy. All tickets £10.
Book tickets for Glitterbug screening on Sunday 22 March at 4.30pm.
About Glitterbug:
Derek Jarman's "Glitterbug" is a lissome montage of Jarman's Super 8 footage fused with a multitextured Brian Eno score. The film constitutes a breathless journey taking in the director's films, friends and favoured stomping grounds. It is a beautiful final addition to Jarman’s eclectic output.
Despite jaunts to Italy, Spain and the English countryside, London remains an omnipresent factor in “Glitterbug.” The film eloquently captures the city’s physical presence, from moody, gray Thames scenes to orderly parks and gardens to starkly ugly housing estates. It glances back at the pre-AIDS days of parties , drugs and drag, typified by gutter-glam footage of Andrew Logan’s Alternative Miss World contest.
Perhaps the most arresting sequences are those devoted to Tilda Swinton, who has appeared in all of Jarman’s films beginning with “Caravaggio.” She’s first seen straddling a boar, heroically brandishing a sword, then playfully darting around a garden maze at her family castle in Scotland.
Crabb’s seamless editing cleverly exploits the technical limitations of Super 8, using occasional lack of definition to create the illusion of images melding into one other. Blowup quality is fine given the footage’s origins.
Featuring Adam Ant, William S. Burroughs, Michael Clark, Duggie Fields, Derek Jarman, Andrew Logan, Genesis P-Orridge, Tilda Swinton and Toyah Willcox.
100% of ticket sales for our Glitterbug screening will go to Art Fund to help secure Prospect Cottage and Jarman’s Legacy. All tickets £10.
Book tickets for Glitterbug screening on Sunday 22 March at 4.30pm.
Exhibition at Lucy Bell Gallery and other local events
Other local events to support the cause include the Friends of Derek (FOD) exhibition. It's a set of Unseen Photographs and film of Derek Jarman and Prospect Cottage by Derek Brown, Richard Heslop, Mark French, Steve Pyke MBE, Ed Sykes, Andrew Catlin, Jan Baldwin, Debi Angel and soundscape by Simon Fisher-Turner.
Curated by Derek Brown, this is an exhibition in support of Art Fund’s campaign to save Prospect Cottage.
The preview is on Saturday 29 February, 6-9pm, with the exhibition continuing until 31 March 2020. The gallery is open Tuesday – Saturday, 11am-4pm. Admission is free.
Kino Teatr will also be screening Jarman's film 'The Garden' on Thursday 5 March at 7.30pm. Tickets £9.
25% of all exhibition and 'The Garden' ticket sales will go to Art Fund to help secure Prospect Cottage and Jarman’s Legacy.
About Jarman's films
Jarman's early films were experimental Super 8mm shorts, a form he never entirely abandoned, developing further in his films Imagining October (1984), The Angelic Conversation (1985) The Last of England (1987) and The Garden (1990). In 1977 he made “Jubilee” which has been described as "Britain's only decent Punk Film featuring punk figures Wayne County, Jordan, Toyah Willcox and Adam and The Ants. It is Caravaggio though that is probably Jarman’s most widely known film, in which he worked with actress Tilda Swinton for the first time.
There's still a long way to go to help save Derek Jarman's inspirational seaside home! Please share and shout about the campaign on social media. #SaveProspectCottage