Youth

Youth is a time defined by change, growth and a fiery teenage spirit that questions authority, challenges the status quo and forges its own path. Many of the films highlight youthful creativity – from attempts at self-representation through play and communal dialogue and filmmaking. In this collection, we see 1980s youth dreaming for a queer utopia, young students questioning the failures of the UK’s education system, a social realist film made by young Black men in East London, to irreverent sketches written by young women and independent Youth Arts projects. All the films are concerned with the possibility of representing one’s own reality, away from the cloying influence of parents, teachers, authorities who fail to understand the radical wisdom of such bright, untethered imagination. Oftentimes, the confessional conversations between various young individuals in the tapes also reveal how existing structures have disillusioned them, failed to protect them or pushed them to look for and create a new model that can expand alongside the breadth of their desires.

Featured videos include: Step Forward Youth (1977), A Netful of Holes (1981), Conversations Over/ Liz & Pauline (1970), Cultural Herb Festival (1983), Dead Proud (1988), Familiar Feelings (1982), Framed Youth — Revenge of the Teenage Perverts (1983), Reframed Youth (2013), From Protest to Resistance (1983), Girls 1 (1970), Girls Dance Group (1976), Let's See Action Basement Writers' TV Show (1976), Masks/Self Portraits (1970), Has School Failed Us (1980), Legal Aid (1974), Moving Away from the Walls (1984), Old Schools/New Buildings (1977), Tunde’s Film (1973), Us Girls (1979).