BOB BICKNELL-KNIGHT

We’ve Been Here Before, 2021
Single channel 4K video
6 mins 34 sec
Commissioned by The Bass x Daata

We’ve Been Here Before (2021) is a CGI film by Bob Bicknell-Knight, concerning the boundaries between public and private space, forgotten histories, simulated worlds and apocalyptic futures. The work presents a series of digital replicas of real-life, physical spaces, virtually duplicated in architectural simulation software, alongside several 3D models of contemporary technologies that have been heavily eroded.

The three locations explored in the film are the headquarters of GCHQ, a government organisation responsible for digitally surveilling people in the UK and abroad; the headquarters of the social media website Facebook in Menlo Park, California and Fisher Island, Miami, a barrier island which has the highest per capita income of any place in the United States, and will be one of the first locations in the US to be swallowed by rising sea levels.

These visual elements are accompanied by an ominous computer-generated voiceover speaking about a fictionalised future where the coming climate crisis has forced the global oceans to rise, with human beings escaping into mountainous regions and digital worlds.

The work is available to purchase from Daata here – daata.art/art/bob-bicknell-knight-we-ve-been-here-before

We’ve Been Here Before has been included in the following exhibitions:

– Kino Club Helsinki, Sailing Boat Screening. At Capellanaukio, Kalasatama, Helsinki, FI, 31st August 2025.
– 2QUEENS 2SCREENS 2. At Two Queens, Leicester, UK, 28th April 2023.
– For Man is Coming Here, curated by Susan Lord. At Bury Art Museum & Sculpture Centre, Bury, UK, 4th March – 21st October 2023.
– Breaking the frame: CRASSH outdoor film festival, selected by Steven Connor, Julia Rone, Thomas Deyekser and Judith Weik. At CRASSH, Alison Richard Building, Cambridge, UK, 30th September 2022.
– Simultan Festival XVII: The Changing and The Intermediate. At Timișoara, RO, 10th – 18th September 2022.
– The World of Light, curated by David Yetton. Online at theworldoflight.net, 5th -14th November 2021.
– Bob Bicknell-Knight X Keiken. At Soundscape Park, New World Symphony, Miami, Florida, USA, 17th April 2021.