The Sprawl (2020), Site Gallery, Sheffield 

HD film, 31min 30sec and 7.1 sound 

Installation Walk Through ~ view here (3 mins - immersive film starts at 1.45)

Stream “The Sprawl” in full ~ view here (30 mins)

This artist film is one of three components of Points of Rupture, Phoebe Davies’ solo exhibition at Site Gallery, Sheffield. The film exists with an expansive floor design, responsive lighting scenography, and a multi-channel soundscape.

The Sprawl follows a small wrestling club on the outskirts of Oslo, Norway, and their team of young female wrestlers. Filmed over the course of a year, it documents day-to-day routines at the club, team interactions, and their training, sparring and recovery from injury. Moving between moments of tenderness, strength and aggression, we are witness to the wrestlers being encouraged to struggle against each other, testing their mental and physical resilience.

Viscera (2022), CIRCA X Dazed

Public screenings at Piccadilly Lights (London), Kurfürstendamm (Berlin), K-POP Square (Seoul), and Federation Square (Melbourne), commissioned by the Wellcome Collection.

HD film, 12mins, stereo sound 

Stream “Viscera” in full ~ view here (12 mins)

Viscera is a short film directed by Phoebe Davies and Nandi Bhebhe (Bhebhe&Davies) which dramatises research drawn from real-life interviews on women’s experiences of rage, weaving immersive choreography and sound to explore how wrath surges through the body. Developed during Bhebhe&Davies’s residency at Wellcome Collection, the work investigates who is permitted to express their feelings in different social contexts, and how identity shapes emotional freedom.

A Duet, Lying on Behalf of All Women (2024), g39, Cardiff

HD film, 12mins, surround sound 

Stream “A Duet” in full ~ view here (12 mins)

As part of her ongoing series Lying on Behalf of All Women, Davies turns the lens on herself, using her own body and voice to interrogate the perils of pregnancy, bodily trauma, lived experience and mythologies. The viewer is invited to spend time with an intimate performance-to-camera, as a heavily pregnant woman struggles to navigate herself into a bathtub, grappling physically and emotionally with her foreign body. Accompanying A Duet is the text work Hoax, part of an evolving collection of the artist’s writing and in this instance presented as a take-away print within the exhibition.

Content Warning: This work contains nudity and references pregnancy, labour, birth and bodily trauma. Some viewers may find this work emotionally challenging or distressing.