Esther Johnson
Esther Johnson is an artist, filmmaker, photographer and curator. She is an independent curator, is Senior Lecturer at the Institute of Art and Design at Sheffield Hallam University, and former Director and Curator of Hull Film and the Hull International Short Film Festival. Her award-winning films have exhibited globally in film festivals, galleries and cinemas, on television, and in adapted versions for radio. Johnson’s work takes a poetic and experimental approach to documentary, through film, video, audio, photography, installations and writing.
Taking the form of an experimental portrait Celestial explores the poetry of the sky, a space of fascination and contemplation. The sky is examined as a place that is not purely a background, but rather an object to be viewed and a ‘mental decongestant’. The film mixes interviews with weather experts, scientists and cloud lovers; time-lapse footage, split-screen and visual text; cloud formations and weather monitoring stations; aerial views and people cloud-spotting, which are interwoven within a shifting soundscape to create a dense tapestry that looks at the vast canvas of the sky.
Celestial features the voices of: Professor Grant Bigg; Jack Borden; Dr Edward Hanna; Richard Hollis; Darcy Ladd; Gavin Pretor-Pinney (founder of the Cloud Appreciation Society) and Gini Wells.
Celestial was commissioned by The Bigger Picture as a public realm work for the BBC Big Screen Network throughout the UK. The commission was managed by Cornerhouse, Manchester and co-produced by Lumen, Leeds.
Image: Celestial, 2007 (still) © Esther Johnson