Sam Taylor-Johnson
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Sam Taylor-Wood (born London, England, 4 March 1967) is a contemporary artist working mostly in video and photography. She has been identified as a member of the young British Artist group, and is a graduate of Goldsmiths College.
Taylor-Wood's parents divorced when she was a teenager, and she moved with her mother and stepfather to a New Age commune in Surrey. It is commonly believed that Sam's mother abandoned the family when her daughter was sixteen and she moved into a bed-sit to live alone, but in reality Sam moved to Brighton to attend fashion college with her boyfriend at the time (Jake Chapman) before her mother left. Having fared poorly in exams, it took Taylor-Wood several years to gain the required qualification for entry into art school. After a year at a North London Polytechnic, she transferred to Goldsmiths College to complete a Fine Art degree in 1990.
Jobs at the Royal Opera House, and managed the Camden Palace nightclub. In 1991 her work began to appear in a number of group exhibitions alongside that of contemporaries from Goldsmiths. Her breakthrough came in 1994 with the work Killing Time in which four people mimed an opera score. From that point multi-screen video works became the main focus of Taylor-Wood's work. Beginning with the video works Travesty of a Mockery and Pent-Up in 1996, Taylor-Wood began to use professional actors. Her work since 1996 has often featured celebrity friends: Elton John was included in a large photo-work, and commissioned Taylor-Wood to make a promotional video starring Robert Downey Jr. for one of his records. In 2002, Taylor-Wood was commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery to make a video portrait of David Beckham sleeping.
She is also a long-time collaborator with Pet Shop Boys having produced films for their Somewhere concerts at the Savoy Theatre, London. She has also been guest vocalist on two Pet Shop Boys produced songs - in the Boys' rendition of Serge Gainsbourg's "Je t'aime... moi non plus" and Donna Summer's "Love to Love You Baby". For the latter of these two releases, she used the pseudonym Kiki Kokova. In February 2008, another Kiki Kokova and Pet Shop Boys collaboration is due, this time it will be a cover of "I'm in love with a German film star" by the Passions.
Taylor-Wood was nominated for the Turner Prize in 1997.
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