26-466: Young Soul Rebels is a 1991 British coming-of-age thriller written by Derek Saldaan McClintock, Isaac Julien and Paul Hallam, and directed by Julien as his second narrative feature film. The film examines the interaction between youth cultural movements during the late 1970s in the UK — namely skinheads , punks , and soulboys — along with the social, political, and cultural tensions between them. The film
52-574: A major retrospective of his work titled What Freedom Is to Me . The exhibition was set to open at the Bonnefantenmuseum in Maastrict in March 2024. The Pérez Art Museum Miami acquired Julien's Ogun’s Return (Once Again... Statues Never Die) (2022) for the museum collection as part of its PAMM Fund for Black Art in 2024. In this same year, Sir Isaac Julien's films were on view at
78-535: A powerfully visual narrative. Thematically, much of his work directly relates to experiences of black and gay identity (he is himself gay), including issues of class, sexuality, and artistic and cultural history. Julien is a documentary filmmaker, and his work in this genre includes BaadAsssss Cinema , a film on the history and influence of blaxploitation cinema. In 2023, the Tate Gallery in London held
104-799: A visiting seminar leader in the MFA Art Practice programme at the School of Visual Arts , and a visiting professor at the Whitney Independent Study Program in New York City. He was also a research fellow at Goldsmiths College, University of London , and in September 2009 he became a professor at the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design . In 2018, Julien joined UC Santa Cruz , where he
130-600: Is a British installation artist , filmmaker, and Distinguished Professor of the Arts at the University of California, Santa Cruz . Julien was born in the East End of London , one of the five children of his parents, who had migrated to Britain from St Lucia . He graduated in 1985 from Saint Martin's School of Art , where he studied painting and fine art film. He co-founded Sankofa Film and Video Collective in 1983, and
156-481: Is a punk that espouses the views of the Socialist Workers Party while wearing (admittedly stolen) Vivienne Westwood designer T-shirts. The character Billiibud gets his name from the fictional character "Billy Budd" from Herman Melville 's novel " Billy Budd, Sailor ". In this novel Billy Budd is described as "renowned for his good looks and gentle, innocent ways". Similarly, in the film Billibud
182-483: Is known for being good looking. However, in Melville's novel the character is also known for being on the less intelligent and gullible side, as seen for his "inability to perceive ill will in other people" and has an "unpredictable tendency to stutter". In comparison, in the film Billibud is also portrayed as somewhat dimwitted. Chris and Caz then have a showdown on the roof of the tower block and Chris nearly falls off
208-551: Is the distinguished professor of the arts. Julien is a patron of the Live Art Development Agency . Batty boy In Jamaican Patois , batty boy (also batty bwoy , batty man , and chi chi bwoy/man ) is a slur often used to refer to a gay or effeminate man. The term batiman (or battyman ) is also used in Belize owing to the popularity of Jamaican music there. The term derives from
234-575: The Queen's Silver Jubilee . The film begins as buddy movie between two friends, Chris and Caz, who run a pirate radio station from a tower block in Dalston , East London . The film starts with the murder of their friend TJ while cruising for sex in the local park at night. While Caz is distraught by the death of his friend, Chris seems focused on balancing a professional career in commercial radio without selling out. They both want to promote soul music while
260-577: The 2024 Whitney Biennial . Julien cites cultural theorist and sociologist Stuart Hall as an important influence on his filmmaking. Hall narrates a portion of Looking for Langston . Julien involves Hall in his work once more in the 1996 film Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Mask , which tells the story of Frantz Fanon , the theorist and psychiatrist from Martinique. As a member of the Sankofa Film and Video Collective , Julien made The Passion of Remembrance (1986), "which attempts to deal with
286-510: The Jamaican slang word batty , which refers to buttocks. It is a slur and considered offensive. Certain forms of Jamaican music feature both homophobic and extremely violent themes. One such example of this is the 1992 dancehall hit "Boom Bye Bye" by Buju Banton which contains lyrics that advocate the killing of gay men . The pejorative chi chi man forms the title of a T.O.K. song about killing gay men and setting them on fire; it
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#1732798168829312-733: The Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery , Washington DC, and the Whitney Museum of American Art , New York. The first, a solo presentation and multichannel installation Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour—Frederick Douglass, and the latter, the cinematic installation Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die), a commentary on the life and work of Alain Locke , Harlem Renaissance philosopher, in dialogue with Albert C. Barnes about African art, at
338-453: The arts and was knighted in the 2022 Birthday Honours for services to diversity and inclusion in art. He was elected a Royal Academician in 2017. Julien lives and works in London , England, and Santa Cruz, California . He works with his partner Mark Nash . Julien was a visiting lecturer at Harvard University 's Departments of Afro-American and Visual Environmental Studies, and was
364-623: The difficulties of constructing a documentary history of black political experience by foregrounding questions of chauvinism and homophobia." In 2007, Julien participated in Performa 07 creating his first evening-length production Cast No Shadow in collaboration with Rusell Maliphant . Since 2018, Julien has been a member of the Curatorial Advisory Group at the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa . In 2019, he
390-769: The film world with his 1989 drama-documentary Looking for Langston , gaining a cult following with this poetic exploration of Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance . His following grew when his film Young Soul Rebels won the Semaine de la Critique prize for best film at the Cannes Film Festival in 1991. One of the objectives of Julien's work is to break down the barriers that exist between different artistic disciplines, drawing from and commenting on film, dance, photography, music, theatre, painting and sculpture, and uniting these to construct
416-484: The gay men around them. The film ends with the two DJs reconciling their differences while they clean records, which is followed by a one-by-one each of the friends joining into dance together. The film received the Critics' Prize at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival . Official Soundtrack Credits Isaac Julien Goldsmiths, University of London Sir Isaac Julien CBE RA (born 21 February 1960 )
442-408: The prevailing popular music is punk. The murder and the different paths they diverge on causes tension between buddies Chris and Caz. Chris discovers that he has a tape recording of the murder but fails to hand it in as evidence. He is then pulled in by the police as a suspect because he was in possession of TJ's cassette radio. He tries to call Caz but Caz is busy with his new boyfriend, Billibud, who
468-415: The racial and sexual tensions of 1970s Britain, with skinheads hassling Chris and Caz, whites making snide remarks about how things have changed since their youth, and blacks stating that they are unable to decide if they hate whites, mixed-race people or "batty boys" most. Yet, despite all of this, youth in the clubs are enjoying the music, drinking, dancing and bonking inter-racially while paying no mind to
494-451: The relationship between a gay punk Billibud ( Jason Durr ) and a soulboy Caz (Mo Sesay) and the racism and homophobia they face in both West Indian and white British communities. The film is a love story that can be seen as an allegory for racial and class solidarity, as their love transcends class and race barriers. Set in London in June 1977, the plot takes place against the background of
520-477: The revelations regarding TJ's murderer. A Molotov cocktail is thrown onto the stage and Caz and Billibud begin trying to save the vinyl records. Chris puts on the tape of TJ's murder, but doing so requires going onto the stage. TJ's murderer, a member of the National Front , follows Chris on stage, whereupon he falls to his death in the inferno of his own creation. The scene is a bitter-sweet microcosm of
546-463: The roof. He then meets Tracy and she persuades him to send the tape to the police, but not before he has made a copy. They then make love on a rooftop. On the day of the Silver Jubilee celebrations Caz and Billibud go to the street fair, where Billibud is attacked by local skinheads. Caz and Billibud return home and make love. That evening Chris goes to the radio station but Caz is not there and
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#1732798168829572-476: The studio has been vandalised. He starts broadcasting "Funk the Jubilee" but feels is not the same without his partner, Caz. Chris is then attacked by TJ's murderer, who turns out to be someone he and Caz had thought of as a friend. He escapes but cannot find Caz. A grand reckoning takes place at an open-air disco in the park where TJ was murdered. While Caz and Billibud are MCing, Chris attempts to warn them about
598-857: Was a founding member of Normal Films in 1991. In 1980, Julien organized the Sankofa Film and Video Collective with, among others, Martina Attille, Maureen Blackwood, Nadine Marsh-Edwards , which was "dedicated to developing an independent black film culture in the areas of production, exhibition and audience". He received a BA Honours degree in Fine Art Film and Video from Saint Martins School of Art , London (1984), where he worked alongside artists, film-makers and lecturers Malcolm Le Grice , William Raban, Anna Thew, Tina Keane, Vera Neubauer , and co-students, directors and film-makers Adam Finch , Richard Heslop and Sandra Lahire, and completed his postdoctoral studies at Les entrepreneurs de l'audiovisuel européen, Brussels (1989). Julien achieved prominence in
624-884: Was a member of the jury that selected Arthur Jafa as winner of the Prince Pierre Foundation 's International Contemporary Art Prize. Julien was nominated for the Turner Prize in 2001, and in 2003 he won the Grand Jury Prize at the Kunstfilm Biennale in Cologne for his single-screen version of Baltimore . Julien was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2017 Birthday Honours for services to
650-523: Was released in the United Kingdom on 9 August 1991, followed by a North American release on 6 December 1991. The film was the feature film acting debut of Sophie Okonedo and Eamonn Walker . The film revolves around various plots. The central story-line is about a murder investigation involving one of the central characters Chris ( Valentine Nonyela ) and his relationship with his girlfriend Tracy ( Sophie Okonedo ). The second narrative involves
676-539: Was the Jamaican Labour Party 's 2001 theme song. In the following year, the People's National Party similarly based their slogan "Log On to Progress" on Elephant Man 's track "Log On" which likewise features some violent and homophobic lyrics (e.g. "step pon chi chi man", i.e. "stomp on a faggot"). British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen frequently used the expression in his Ali G character, including in
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