Video
Libeau’s visual aesthetics tow the line of discomfort and delicate touch, an obsessive ongoing game of sensory roulette.
Whether directing video work for her own projects or those of others, Libeau/Magee revels in the tensions between “poor” and “wealthy” technologies and images. Sumptuously shot clips are perturbed by their unsettling or mundane contents.
Libeau’s video work seizes on the contingencies of poor-quality “found” footage (often calling to the cultural landscape of their home country Aotearoa New Zealand) and the possibilities of chop-up methods. Technologies at hand are embraced with vigor: low-resolution handy-cam work parallels the DIY / “amator” philosophies that pervade Libeau’s work and those of their peers. This echoes Maya Deren’s treatise that “the most important part of your equipment is yourself”.
Weird Weather; i.e. crazy; music video; dir. Frances Libeau; 2022
Weird Weather
i.e. crazy
dir. Frances Libeau
From the album Country Justice
i.e. crazy
dir. Frances Libeau
From the album Country Justice
This video began during the first Covid lockdown filming a refraction of sunlight through the studio window in Ōtepoti. It was given new life after a freak spring lightning storm in Tāmaki Makaurau, with many borrowed hours from weather, volcano & underwater cameras around Aotearoa.
Low-res digital solids were gathered & stacked into disparate piles, then held up to the light, one by one, to see how each plane might shine through the others.
Part cyborg erotica, car advert, & lament for a dying planet, Weird Weather plays with notions of weight & weightlessness, submission & control; absence & presence as it steers serenely through a troubled landscape.
Low-res digital solids were gathered & stacked into disparate piles, then held up to the light, one by one, to see how each plane might shine through the others.
Part cyborg erotica, car advert, & lament for a dying planet, Weird Weather plays with notions of weight & weightlessness, submission & control; absence & presence as it steers serenely through a troubled landscape.
Country Justice; i.e. crazy; music video; dir. Holly Mia; 2021
Country Justice
i.e. crazy
dir. Holly Mia
From the album Country Justice
i.e. crazy
dir. Holly Mia
From the album Country Justice
Holly Mia's visual response to Country Justice is a collage of remediated colonial imagery from a myriad of local historic sources: televised sheepdog competitions, agri-tourism flicks, Miss Wool 1951, kauri logging footage & its descendant field-day timbersports, creamiest-flakiest dairy product promos, Great Kiwi Road-trips, meat processing plants & DIY farming clips. Extra footage was contributed by Holly Mia, Frances Libeau & Imogen Taylor.
Manaaki whenua – Manaaki tangata – Haere whakamua
Manaaki whenua – Manaaki tangata – Haere whakamua
Praying Mantis; i.e. crazy; music video; dir. Maggie Magee; Muzai Records; 2017
Praying Mantis
i.e. crazy
dir. Maggie Magee (aka Claire Duncan)
From the album Non Compos Mentis, released in 2017 on Muzai Records.
i.e. crazy
dir. Maggie Magee (aka Claire Duncan)
From the album Non Compos Mentis, released in 2017 on Muzai Records.
Praying Mantis features chop-up collaged visuals of the sensuous and the squeamish - a comforting lick of toffee, the soft twinkle of perfectly manicured nails on a desktop, or the garish bright splash of blood on pink butcher’s scrubs. Directed and intuitively edited by Maggie Magee, the video comprises footage of serious ASMR YouTubers ASMRTHECHEW & ASMRDeutscheVita, as well as a spread of other dubiously obtained material. A song musing on the cannibalistic nature of sexual appetite, Praying Mantis sees fluids spilled, spent, sucked and swallowed, limbs ingested and rejected, bodies fused together as in Medusian stone - death, stasis; immortality.
The Ape (Plastic Surgery Song); i.e. crazy; music video; dir. Literal Fuck; Muzai Records; 2017
The Ape (Plastic Surgery Song)
i.e. crazy
dir. Literal Fuck (aka Claire Duncan & Veronica Crockford-Pound)
DOP – Joseph Griffen
Editor – Luke McPake
Performed by Maggie Magee with:
Vodka Mocktail
Bitch on Bike
Spag Bol Malaise
Betty Blooper
From the album Non Compos Mentis, released in 2017 on Muzai Records.
i.e. crazy
dir. Literal Fuck (aka Claire Duncan & Veronica Crockford-Pound)
DOP – Joseph Griffen
Editor – Luke McPake
Performed by Maggie Magee with:
Vodka Mocktail
Bitch on Bike
Spag Bol Malaise
Betty Blooper
From the album Non Compos Mentis, released in 2017 on Muzai Records.
An Incident on the Edge of Town; i.e. crazy; music video; dir. Maggie Magee; Muzai Records; 2016
An Incident on the Edge of Town
i.e. crazy
dir. Maggie Magee (aka Claire Duncan)
Featuring footage from "Housing in New Zealand", produced by Public Works Department Film Unit in 1945 (AAOJ W5034/1798).
Extra footage shot by Sean Kelly at Bach 62.
From the album Non Compos Mentis, released in 2017 on Muzai Records.
i.e. crazy
dir. Maggie Magee (aka Claire Duncan)
Featuring footage from "Housing in New Zealand", produced by Public Works Department Film Unit in 1945 (AAOJ W5034/1798).
Extra footage shot by Sean Kelly at Bach 62.
From the album Non Compos Mentis, released in 2017 on Muzai Records.
"A nation’s prosperity isn’t measured in exports and show and false fronts. It’s in the way people live and how much sun they get... where the kids grow up and how sanitation works.”
An Incident on the Edge of Town; i.e. crazy; dir. Maggie Magee; Muzai Records; 2016
You’re a Stranger (to me now); i.e. crazy; music video; dir. Claire Duncan; Muzai Records; 2015
You’re a Stranger (to me now)
i.e. crazy
dir. Claire Duncan.
Starring Maggie Magee.
Shot by Sean Kelly at Bach 62.
From the album Non Compos Mentis, released in 2017 on Muzai Records.
i.e. crazy
dir. Claire Duncan.
Starring Maggie Magee.
Shot by Sean Kelly at Bach 62.
From the album Non Compos Mentis, released in 2017 on Muzai Records.
Bury; Seth Frightening; music video; dir. Claire Duncan; 2015
Bury
Seth Frightening
Made by Claire Duncan at Bach 62
Seth Frightening performing 'Bury'
From the album But We Love Our Brothers and Sisters, 2015
Seth Frightening
Made by Claire Duncan at Bach 62
Seth Frightening performing 'Bury'
From the album But We Love Our Brothers and Sisters, 2015
Land of the Long White Stain; HD/handycam documentary film; dir. Claire Duncan; 2015
Land of the Long White Stain
A Love Letter to Music on the Margins
ft.
Seth Frightening
Shab Orkestra
i.e. crazy
Girls Pissing on Girls Pissing
Lumière Industries 2015
Written and Directed by Claire Duncan
Produced by Melinda Jackson
Director of Photography: Joe Hitchcock
Editor: Luke McPake
Series Producer: Tim Wong
A Love Letter to Music on the Margins
ft.
Seth Frightening
Shab Orkestra
i.e. crazy
Girls Pissing on Girls Pissing
Lumière Industries 2015
Written and Directed by Claire Duncan
Produced by Melinda Jackson
Director of Photography: Joe Hitchcock
Editor: Luke McPake
Series Producer: Tim Wong
“Claire Duncan’s ‘love-letter to music on the margins’ punctures the romantic view of the touring musician (with withering narration playing over images of rural backwaters) while simultaneously affirming the virtues of self-expression, and the special transience of live performance. Featured are interviews and arresting performances from some of NZ’s most singular new artists: Seth Frightening, i.e. crazy (the director’s musical alias) and Girls Pissing On Girls Pissing.“
– NZ on Screen
– NZ on Screen