Jeremy Deller on Joy in People

A much-acclaimed exhibition of Jeremy Deller’s work to date, Joy in People brought together the light and the dark from Deller’s ever-spiralling view on the world, occasionally within the same piece.

The artist is no stranger to the serious side of social history, as evidenced in pieces such as The Battle of Orgreave (2001) – a battle re-enactment of the most violent of exchanges in the 1984-85 Miners’ Strike – and It Is What It Is (2009) – a burnt-out car lifted from a Baghdad bombing. But Joy in People was not a title born from irony, and the playfulness of Deller’s character could be seen, and also experienced, courtesy of Valerie’s Snack Bar (2009), a recreation of a Bury Market café, and Acid Brass (2007) – a performance of contemporary acid house tracks by the William Fairey Brass Band.

It’s the William Fairey Brass Band’s Deller-orchestrated take on ‘Voodoo Ray’ which soundtracks this video filmed ahead of the exhibition’s opening in February 2012. In it we hear from Deller, who gives an overview of the retrospective, before sitting down with Hayward Gallery Director Ralph Rugoff for a cup of tea and a chin-wag in Valerie’s Snack Bar.

“I’m always interested to see how the public will react to things, and what they like and what they don’t like. That’s part of the work almost, is the reaction, and the play between the public and the work.”

Jeremy Deller