Vicki Bennett

APEngine spoke with Vicki Bennett otherwise known as People Like Us about her work, including her recent commission for The Great North Run.

Since 1991 British artist Vicki Bennett has been an influential figure in the field of audio visual collage, through her innovative sampling, appropriating and cutting up of found footage and archives. Using collage as her main form of expression, she creates audio recordings, films and radio shows that mix, manipulate and rework original sources from both the experimental and popular worlds of music, film, television and radio.

People Like Us believe in open access to archives for creative use, and have made work using footage from the Prelinger Archives, The Internet Archive, and A/V Geeks. In 2006 she was the first artist to be given unrestricted access to the entire BBC Archive. People Like Us have previously shown work at Tate Modern, Sydney Opera House, Pompidou left and Sonar, and performed radio sessions for John Peel and Mixing It. The ongoing sound art radio show ‘Do or DIY’ on WFMU has had over three quarters of a million hits since 2003.

Check out Vicki’s three-screen video installation Work, Rest & Play on Engine. The People Like Us back catalogue is available for free download hosted by UbuWeb and more information on Vicki and her work can be found at peoplelikeus.org.