Victoria Miro presents Stan Douglas’ sixth solo exhibition with the gallery, which features the European premiere of the Canadian artist’s multi-channel video installation, Birth of a Nation, and works from a new photographic series, The Enemy of All Mankind: Nine Scenes from John Gay’s Polly.
Since the late-1980s, Stan Douglas has examined complex intersections of narrative, fact and fiction while simultaneously scrutinising the media he employs, technology’s role in image making and its influence on our understanding of reality. This exhibition marks the European premiere of Birth of a Nation, Douglas’ new multi-channel video installation that confronts D.W. Griffith’s controversial 1915 film The Birth of a Nation, a technically groundbreaking but deeply racist work that exalts white supremacy. Griffith’s innovations, including the introduction of narrative crosscuts and a progressive use of techniques including close-ups and fade-outs, stand in stark contrast to his film’s subject matter. Based on Thomas Dixon Jr.’s 1905 novel The Clansman: A Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan, Griffith’s film is set during the American Civil War of the 1860s and into the subsequent Reconstruction period and was intended to redress any progress towards racial equality made between that time and its creation.
| Duration | 26 September 2025 - 01 November 2025 |
| Times | Tuesday–Saturday: 10am–6pm |
| Cost | Free |
| Venue | Victoria Miro London |
| Address | 16 Wharf Road, London, N1 7RW |
| Contact | 4402073368109 / info@victoria-miro.com / www.victoria-miro.com |