Monkey Drummer - Monkey Drummer

What this video is

Monkey Drummer sits at the precise intersection of the IDM music scene's late-period peak and the early-2000s expansion of music video into contemporary fine art. Commissioned by a commercial London gallery and debuted at the Venice Biennale rather than on MTV, it represents a conscious rejection of broadcast music video culture in favour of the white-cube gallery context. Its Aphex Twin soundtrack — the…

Why it matters

A landmark in the convergence of IDM music video practice and contemporary fine art installation. Monkey Drummer effectively legitimised the music video as a gallery object, preceding the broader art-world acceptance of video art as collectible work. Cunningham's precise Mickey-mousing technique —…

The director

Chris Cunningham (born 15 October 1970, Reading, England) is an English video artist and music video director. Early in his career he worked as a comic book artist for 2000 AD and designed animatronic prototypes for Stanley Kubrick's A.I. He is known for…