Teenage Wildlife surveys the rich source of inspiration film and video artists have found within the subject of youth. The short films featured in this self-selection videotheque, range from tales of loneliness and confusion, angst, excess, bad behaviour and empowerment to poetic portraits of how some teenagers like to spend their time and lyrical re-workings of existing footage.

The works included span from the 1950s when the term ‘teen’ first became widely used, to the present day. Films by Karel Reisz, Lynne Ramsey, Ridley Scott, Asif Kapadia and Bill Douglas are  included alongside artists’ film and video by Martin Arnold, Carol Morley, Andrew Kötting and Cordelia Swann, amongst others. The main section of the videotheque has been curated by artist/film-maker, Esther Johnson.

Site has also been working in collaboration with Showcomotion, Sheffield’s young people’s film festival, held at the Showroom Cinema, to include highlights of the festival programme, giving an opportunity to view the work at any time during and after the festival. This includes the unicef uk Awards, Summer Shorts and Philip Ilson’s animation shorts selection. To complete the videotheque, Site has invited musician and patron, Jarvis Cocker, film-maker Lynne Ramsey and artist Mohamed Bourouissa to make their own personal selection of films.

Visitors can browse a menu of works, select films to watch and recommend favourite films to others by writing a short review.

Win a video ipod: Anyone who reviews a film will be entered into a draw for a video ipod with a range of artists’ films uploaded onto it.

How to use it:

·      have a look at the menus - in files or on the computer or browse other visitors’ reviews & choose a film to watch

·      find your chosen film on the shelf (they’re in alphabetical order of title)

·      Play on one of the DVD players  - you can choose either to watch on the TVs or if it’s a longer film you might like to use the projector/cordless headphones and sit on the sofa..

·      feel free to bring food and drink into the videotheque