British artist Hilary Lloyd on fusing textile, sound and video in her practice

When she talks about her practice, Hilary Lloyd is always quick to point out that she is ‘not a filmmaker’. And yet, video footage always makes its way into her works, shot in her singular style and identifiable for its repetitive movements, jump cuts and sweeps. It’s a frenetic rhythm that’s been related to the restlessness of the contemporary viewer, who consumes images hard and fast.

Lloyd is, by her own admission, something of a techie when it comes to equipment. Her favourite piece of technology is currently ‘the mobile phone’ – although she doesn’t actually own one. Her latest installation includes scenes from a nightclub in Turin, shot spontaneously on a borrowed iPhone and edited together with choppy cuts. You never quite get a clear image of what you’re looking at other than a sense of the atmosphere of the lived moment. ‘Earlier this month I was in Turin, installing the first exhibition in Federica Panelli and Annalisa Stabellini’s new gallery BAR,’ Lloyd tells us. ‘The film was made during the opening night and afterwards we went clubbing and the film was shot using Federica’s phone, because I don’t have one.’

Installation view of ‘Hilary Lloyd’ at Blaffer Art Museum, Texas, 2016

Installation view of ‘Hilary Lloyd’ at Blaffer Art Museum, Texas, 2016

Installation view of ‘Car Park’ at Sadie Coles HQ, London, 2019. Photography: Robert Glowacki. © The artist. Courtesy of Sadie Coles HQ, London

Tie-Dye (yellow and pink circles), 2015, by Hilary Lloyd
Courtesy of  WallPaper Magazine