Abridged 0-45: Why Is It Always December?

Abridged Commentary Part 0-45

This issue (portrait, A4) accompanied an exhibition at Millennium Court Arts Centre, Portadown in 2016. T.S. Eliot’s ‘The Waste Land’ has a firm place on the Abridged bookshelf, and it comes to play in this issue with stills from artist John Smith’s film of the same name on the cover and scattered through… And actually, we think all of the art here is pretty special. One of the only recent issues with the title on the cover, unusual for us and that was because it was a tribute to Peter Saville’s ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ design. (We do love the title, to be fair… which comes from a 1,000 Violins B-Side). There were five other alternative covers for the print edition, by Nadègé Meriau, X-Ray Audio, Siobhan McGibbon, Mhairi Sutherland and Fiona Hession. It’s an issue we’ve really enjoyed revisiting: something of what comes to light in the dark, and what goes dark in the light… Following on from ‘Floodland’, this one raises more questions about the push and pull between memory and oblivion, and the fear in the flux. 

Cover Image: John Smith

Abridged 0-45 was funded by The Arts Council of Northern Ireland

Abridged is funded by The Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the Arts Council of Ireland

This Zone Archive Project is funded by The Arts Council of Ireland