International Space Station Assembly
A Collective Construction Site

James Beckett (b. 1977, Harare, Zimbabwe) graduated from the Technikon-Natal, Durban South Africa, after which he took part in a two-year residency in the Rijksakademie Van Beeldende Kunsten, Amsterdam. Coming from a background of installation, sound has come to develop a more central role in his work.  This has been a research-based activity with output ranging from radio documentaries to mock ethnic bands, and museum displays documenting the cultural and physiological effects of noise.  The evolution in specific areas of the industrial revolution have also played muse; such as the foundation of synthetic colour manufacture and its relationship to BASF, and the cultural implications of vacuum tubes for the Dutch firm Philips.

Together with visual practice he is also a member of the international musicians collective, N-Collective, as well as freelance curator (on occasion), with a focus on sound.
www.jamesbeckett.tk
www.n-collective.com/

For the project in Douala, James is likely to work with one other person to realise a temporary radio station in the city.  The radio station is perceived as an alternative to the  commercial and governmental strains, focusing on local communities in order to provide a voice.  Not just as an alternative but as a means to show media is permeable and accessible for all, the project intends to provide a platform for discussion, local music,  and in general for programming far to local and clumsy to be considered for other channels.

The project will be a return to a radio station set -up in 2003, in collaboration with Goddy Leye and the R.A.I.N network titled 'Bessengue City', which was a temporary station in a  transitional district of the city, a home to appr. 10 000 migrant workers.