DARELL VINER

This information came to me via Dave Cooper of Dando Shaft about the Coventry born Sculptor / artist

Dando shaft c1969

.

 

Dave says -

Thanks for the mail, did you ever come across some of the Happenings at some of the early DANDO SHAFT Pilot  sunday lunchtimes with Darrell Viner he sadly left the stage 2001
Darell Viner Obituary

I think in 1968 he built the first sound activated lighting system in the UK, before PinkFloyd or anyone. 20.000 Watt. I need to make a link as Darrells early invovement with ambience was special.

Stripe_hat_illus

Darell Viner lived in the attic flat in the end house in Barras lane (the other end from Martin Jenkins of Dando Shaft and where Dando started out). We had an ajustable lense projector quite powerful. We were into making our own acid slides oil,bubbles and dyes which we projected onto the synagogue wall down and opposite. The odd late night drunk got quite a colourful suprise. He lived in the Dando house/commune 'The Rest" when we all moved to London in '70, gaining his place at Chelsea in '71. The rest as they say is his story.
coopz

 

Born in 1946 in Coventry, Viner was five when his father, a factory clerk,

DarrellViner

died. His mother raised him and his brother on her own. Though a voracious reader, Viner left school with three O Levels and took a job at Courtaulds' laboratories. He moved to London soon after, and worked on the lighting and rigging for a rock band, testing his designs in the garage-cum-workshop of the house in Ealing where he rented a room. On seeing his work an art historian, brought to Viner's workshop by a mutual friend, suggested that he apply to art school, and in 1971 he entered Hornsey College of Art, where the impact of the radical student sit-ins of 1968 could still be felt. In 1976 Viner completed a postgraduate degree at the Slade School of Fine Art.

 

Darrell Viner gave enormously of his time, skill and knowledge, not only in his work, but also for his students. He taught in numerous institutions, and was Senior Lecturer in Sculpture at Portsmouth University from 1980 to 1989 (where he also taught computing, video, electronics, film, painting and printing), and from 1990 at Chelsea College of Art, both on the BA and MA sculpture courses. Friends and colleagues will miss his considered, forthright and honest feedback, as others will his disconcerting and poetic work.

Darrell James Viner, artist: born Coventry, Warwickshire 12 December 1946; died London 15 November 2001.

Insideoutside

Darrell Viner began using computers in the 1970s as a way of exploring transformation, both in drawings and through animation. Later he included them in his kinetic sculpture and interactive environments. The tape is silent.
 

 

READ HIS FULL STORY ON THE LINK ABOVE

 

Comments

[BroadgateGnome]

So sad to hear of Darell's passing. He was a very strong element in the Co-op that brought about the Hole Gallery, and kept us going whenever we felt like giving up, and added balance to the more outlandish suggestions.
He was off to college before we got things going properly but he did exhibit a series of small globular pieces made from weird looking lumps of plastic that came from the Courtaulds extrusion spinning machines.
I last saw him in London on the day  that the Falklands war was announced. A Strange day. For some reason I had decided to walk into the centre rather than take the tube. On some windswept carriageway I bumped into him, we had both taken the wrong turn when crossing the complicated road.
It was nice to find on chatting that he knew many of the people that worked at London Video Arts  which shared Soho office space with the company I was working with.,
Small World,
DiggerD

[HOBO - Coventry Music Magazine]

Dave Cooper (Coopz) of Dando Shaft messaged via My Space too - here are some pieces on Darrell Viner -

Trevor

Thanks for the mail. Some of the early Pilot sunday lunchtimes with
Darrell Viner he sadly left the stage 2001
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20011122/ai_n14438795

I think in 1968 he built the first sound activated lighting system
in the UK, before The Floyd or anyone 20.000 Watt. I need to make a
link as Darrells early invovement with ambience was special.
Cheers

Dave



Trev

Thanks for the mail. DV lived in the attic flat in the end house in
Barras lane. We had an ajustable lense projector quite powerful. We
were into making our own acid slides oil,bubbles and dyes which we
projected onto the synagogue wall down and opposite. The odd late night
drunk got quite a colourful suprise. He lived in the Dando
house/commune 'The Rest" when we all moved to London in '70, gaining
his place at Chelsea in '71. The rest as they say is his story.

coopz