Making Cats of Tottenham
Cats of Tottenham embraces a deliberately lo-fi, DIY methodology that reflects both the conditions it was made in and the themes it explores. The project began in cramped Tottenham flats using a second-hand video camera, and has since developed into a hybrid process combining iPhones, GoPros, and accessible editing tools such as iMovie and Apple Motion. Rather than aspiring to polish, the work leans into the instability of its materials and methods, treating imperfection as a generative artistic strategy.
The visual world is constructed through green screen compositing, combining filmed dolls with digitally inserted backdrops drawn from local environments such as Tottenham High Road and ASDA supermarkets. The puppets themselves are built from doll parts, clay, chewing gum, and recycled household materials, while sets incorporate dollhouse furniture and hand-crafted props. This bricolage approach produces an aesthetic that is simultaneously playful, unstable, and critical—foregrounding its own making while echoing the precariousness of low-wage work, housing, and survival that the series satirises.
Collaboration is central to the process. I work with writer Will Stuart, whose scripts reconfigure sitcom structures into surreal, feminist narratives, while I develop the visual language, animation, and performance of the dolls. Friends and collaborators contribute voices, set-building, and production support, creating a collective practice that resists hierarchies and professionalisation. The resulting work is not positioned as conventional television or polished animation, but as an expanded artwork: a sitcom that collapses into performance, video art, and social commentary, sustained by the energy of collaboration and the creative possibilities of working with limited means.
