CLICK HERE TO ADD YOUR EVENT

Margaret Tait Commission 2023 - Isabel Barfod: How Much Air Lungs Can Hold

LUX Scotland are delighted to present Isabel Barfod's new Margaret Tait Commission 'How Much Air Lungs Can Hold' at Glasgow Film Theatre, on the evening of Monday 29th April.

Margaret Tait Commission 2023 - Isabel Barfod: How Much Air Lungs Can Hold

About Margaret Tait Commission 2023 - Isabel Barfod: How Much Air Lungs Can Hold

Listed Under Film Events

The screening will be followed by informal drinks at the State Bar.

'How Much Air Lungs Can Hold’ is an intimate gathering of testimony. Composed of experimental animation and audio recordings of conversations with Black swimmers living in Glasgow and London, this film considers the phenomenological resonance that emerges from swimming and its enigmatic relation with Blackness.

Sound recordings of 11 conversations are collaged into a sonic architecture, forming the narrative body of the work, a way to both describe and speculate on the ephemeral states of alteration or transcendence various encounters with water can facilitate. Meditating on how these encounters can be enabled by affirming social practices, and precluded by mechanisms of regulation, coloniality and enclosure.Invested in the sensory as an experiential field for staging Black spatial liberation, ‘How Much Air Lungs Can Hold’ applies immersive, abstracted imagery using CGI, traditional 2D animation and underwater footage, performing as witness and respondent to oral testimony and aural experience.

'How Much Air Lungs Can Hold’ seeks to invoke the aquatic animation of interiority, rememory, non-linearity, entanglement and submergence. Speculative arrangements for Black social life resurface alongside ideas of light:dark, presence:non-presence, legibility:opacity and surface:depth. Probing possibility from embodiment to ask questions of our incommensurable capacity to hold, listen, sense and what it means to bear witness.


Isabel Barfod is an animator and artist based in Glasgow. Working across digital, hand-drawn, 2D and 3D animation, her work is driven by irritation and speculation, looking to process agitations through drawing, scratching and mark making.Her practice seeks to draw out the ‘hard-to-describe’ micro/experiences, feelings and phenomena associated with moving in and out of private/public space as a Black Queer person. Cloaking figures and gestures in abstraction, she evokes absurd, surreal and racialised social realities residing within the ephemeral encounter. As a means of working through her own uncertainty and frustrations, she images reparative and restitutive possibilities that are collectively-imagined and speculated.Previous screenings, grants and commissions include: Margaret Tait Commission (2023/24), Edinburgh Film Festival (2023), In Motion Festival London & Rotterdam (2023), Flamin’ Animations Commission with Film London (2022 2023), Screening at London International Animation Festival, Barbican, London (2022), We Are Here Scotland – Creators Fund (2021) Screening at We Are Here Scotland Creators Showcase, Scotland (2022), Tramway TV – Sidesteps (2022), Take Me Somewhere – sendiri by Claricia Parinussa (2021), Screening at Africa in Motion Film Festival – Sidesteps (original), Scotland (2019).


The Margaret Tait Commission is a LUX Scotland commission delivered in partnership with Glasgow Film, with support from Creative Scotland.

Sponsored Links

Number 10 Hotel
City Of Glasgow Chorus
Fayre Play
City Sightseeing Glasgow

Other Events at Glasgow Film Theatre

Take 2: Family-Friendly Films

Selected dates between 3rd January 2026 - 26th December 2026

Everything from kid-friendly classics to family foreign language and the latest blockbuster releases, Take 2 screenings at Glasgow Film Theatre will keep even the littlest film fans entertained!

READ MORE

Glasgow Film Festival

25th February 2026 - 8th March 2026

The 22nd edition of Glasgow Film Festival, Scotland's largest film festival, will run from 25th February to 8th March at Glasgow Film Theatre and venues across Glasgow and beyond!

READ MORE

Sponsored Links

Enjoy East Ren
Cancer Research UK
Glasgow Vintage Vehicle Trust
Cancer Research UK
ATG

Similar events you might like...

Led Zeppelin: Fulldome Experience

Led Zeppelin: Fulldome Experience

Selected dates between 15th November 2025 - 20th March 2026

Get ready to rock the dome! Don't miss your chance to experience Led Zeppelin like never before in the Planetarium at Glasgow Science Centre!

READ MORE
Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon

Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon

Selected dates between 22nd November 2025 - 13th February 2026

Join Glasgow Science Centre for the Pink Floyd fulldome experience which sets 10 tracks from The Dark Side of the Moon to mesmeric 360° visuals in their digital Planetarium!

READ MORE
Take 2: Family-Friendly Films

Take 2: Family-Friendly Films

Selected dates between 3rd January 2026 - 26th December 2026

Everything from kid-friendly classics to family foreign language and the latest blockbuster releases, Take 2 screenings at Glasgow Film Theatre will keep even the littlest film fans entertained!

READ MORE
Trash Cinema Presents - Revenge of the Ninja

Trash Cinema Presents - Revenge of the Ninja

12th January 2026

Join Trash Cinema this January for a stone-cold Cannon classic, featuring badass backflipping grannies, wee kids with fists of steel and blood-soaked, nailbiting ninja-action!

READ MORE
EatFilm at Sloans

EatFilm at Sloans

Selected dates between 13th January 2026 - 31st March 2026

Your favourite movie night is back! Enjoy a line-up of feel-good films and movie classics plus a meal, popcorn and drink, all set up in the stunning Grand Ballroom at Sloans!

READ MORE
Glasgow Doctor Who Society Film Screening: In The Loop (2009)

Glasgow Doctor Who Society Film Screening: In The Loop (2009)

18th January 2026

Join the Glasgow Doctor Who Society at Loks to watch the hilarious big screen adaptation of hit BBC satire comedy 'The Thick of It' starring Peter Capaldi, written by Armando Iannucci.

READ MORE
Donald WG Lindsay - How’ve You Been? and Outwith

Donald WG Lindsay - How’ve You Been? and Outwith

18th January 2026

Enjoy a forward-thinking night of Scottish music and cinema courtesy of Donald WG Lindsay at The Glad Cafe as part of Celtic Connections 2026!

READ MORE
Partick Film Festival

Partick Film Festival

19th January 2026 - 25th January 2026
Glasgow West End

The annual Partick Film Festival returns for 2026 between Monday 19th and Sunday 25th January, with FREE screenings and events in unique venues across Partick!

READ MORE
Burns and Nature

Burns and Nature

21st January 2026

Join The National Library of Scotland at Kelvin Hall for an exploration of Robert Burns' relationship to nature through poetry, spoken word and film.

READ MORE

Find other events in Glasgow

Sponsored Links

Number 10 Hotel
City Of Glasgow Chorus
Fayre Play
City Sightseeing Glasgow
Enjoy East Ren
Cancer Research UK
Glasgow Vintage Vehicle Trust
Cancer Research UK
ATG

Popular Events

Day Fever Glasgow
DAY FEVER RETURNS TO GLASGOW! Yes, that's right! Day Fever, the Saturday daytime disco, that doesn't ruin your Sunday, is returning to BAaD in 2026!
Glasgow Doctor Who Society Film Screening: In The Loop (2009)
Join the Glasgow Doctor Who Society at Loks to watch the hilarious big screen adaptation of hit BBC satire comedy 'The Thick of It' starring Peter Capaldi, written by Armando Iannucci.
Retro Reels
Step back in time at Riverside Museum and immerse yourself in the unforgettable world of 1980s cinema, on a nostalgic journey through the props, stories, and creativity that shaped a generation.
Blochairn Car Boot Sale
Browse the stalls and bag yourself a bargain at Blochairn Car Boot Sale which is held every Sunday from 6am to 3pm!
Abandoned: International Photography Exhibition
The Glasgow Gallery of Photography are hosting a month long photography exhibition, with the theme Abandoned at their exhibition space on High Street during January!

Popular Listings

Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum King's Theatre Glasgow King Tut's Wah Wah Hut O2 Academy Glasgow SEC Armadillo Theatre Royal Glasgow The Pavilion Theatre Glasgow The Glasgow Barrowland Ballroom The Glasgow Royal Concert Hall The OVO Hydro