"The city belonged to you": Derek Jarman, Londra e i Docklands

Abstract

Between the end of the 1970s and the early 1990s, British artist Derek Jarman (1942-1994) represented London in his films, videos and autobiographical writings. In particular, in the 1970s, Jarman was one of the first artists to go and live in an abandoned warehouse in the Docklands, at the time one of London’s most rundown areas and now a radically regenerated one. In this essay, I will apply an interdisciplinary perspective, rooted in a cultural and urban studies approach, to explore Jarman’s work in relation to his experience of loft-living in the Docklands.
I will trace the connection between Jarman’s peculiar poetics in his writings and films and wider transformation strategies of the urban space, highlighting how his living experience and creative practice in those areas acquire specific meanings when set within the historical context of the time and are still relevant to contemporary urban living challenges. Jarman’s exploration, aimed at the search for a sense of belonging, takes shape in the discovery of alternatives to a standardised experience of everyday living in the city. In this sense, it mirrors not only his personal experiences, but also the challenges of London’s context between the early 1970s and the early 1980s, a crucial historical moment that creates the premises for a radical form of urban renewal still taking place in the present.