Light going on and off

Spent Saturday at a digital aesthetics workshop run by Graham Dean of Highwire. In a few short hours he helped a bunch of (not very techie) artists to master basic programming and electronics to the point where we could contemplate taking data from the world and converting it into another creative form. Though many, very exciting things are possible using the Arduino software and hardware, the pinnacle of our day was making set of LEDs go on and off with a motion sensor. Believe me, when you've connected up the components and amended the code yourself, this is very exciting...

This article may change my life

For some time now, I've been worrying about the relevance of static gallery art. I love galleries, but the work in them often doesn't seem to be addressing anything apart from itself. Meanwhile, out in the real world, there are things I feel quite concerned about - or at least more interested in.

When I started working with Felicity Shillingford on a response to the visit of the British Art Show to Plymouth in the autumn, our first thought was to secure some kind of space in Plymouth and put on a show. But then we thought, why should we go all that way just to add to the quantity of art being exhibited in a city where we don't even live?  A city which has already swallowed up Exeter's art college and many of our artists. And the idea of stealing art and bringing it back to Exeter was born. It's still going to result a gallery-type show, but the really important part of it is the stealing and removing of art to another place, and the negotiations that will be required to do so.

Meanwhile, in attempting to help the Spacex Review Group formulate responses to a project called The Recipe Exchange, I stumbled across an article by Grant Kester called Dialogical Aesthetics: A Critical Framework For Littoral Art.  I'm not expecting to suddenly become a completely different kind of artist as a result of reading it...but I do feel a shift in outlook starting to happen.

www.foundspace.co.uk

A turning point? Or just more of the same?

Attended the Connectivity, Diversity, Criticality conference organised by Turning Point South West at The Brewhouse Theatre & Arts Centre, Taunton yesterday. It set out to "launch and mould a regional programme" that will allow visual artists and arts organisations "to share ideas and resources".

To be honest, I'm always a little suspicious of these high-level, admin-heavy, committee-driven organisations that that seem to soak up the available arts funding like a sponge and never re-distribute it to anything that's actually creative or productive. But, in this case, there has been input from some good artist minds along the way. So I felt optimistic enough to join in and submit myself to break-out groups, flip charts, marker pens and all the other corporate guff I've worked so hard to escape over the past eight years...

There was hot, corporate air aplenty, of course, but real high points too, such as Alistair Hudson of Grizedale Arts speaking on International Links and Local Social Engagement in a Rural Context; artist Steven Paige talking about Independent Artist Initiatives and Exchange; and Curator and Producer Claire Doherty of Situations talking about the SouthWest's Cultural Olympiad Project nowhereisland

As to the outcomes, well, we'll have to wait and see....

Fringe benefits

Pleased and relieved to see a flurry of funding for grassroots visual arts events running alongside the British Art Show 7 when it comes to Plymouth (Sept-Dec 2011).

Come to Ours has been awarded substantial funds by Arts Council England and Plymouth City Council. It's a series of events organised by a group of Plymouth-based artists (Rachel Dobbs, Bryony Gillard, Mark James, Hannah Jones, Beth Emily Richards and Neil Rose).

Meanwhile HEIST, the project I'm producing with Felicity Shillingford, has been awarded a modest grant by Exeter Arts Council (Exeter City Council) to bring a taste of the British Art Show 7 and Plymouth Fringe to Exeter - via the medium of theft.

Further artist-led events in Devon are expected to be announced as part of Plymouth Fringe.

Love and hate and Gabriel Orozco

Gabriel Orozco Pinched Ball

If you want to know how central Gabriel Orozco is to contemporary fine art, ask any artist who's seen his show at Tate Modern what they think. "You know that thing he did with the dryer lint/blown tyre debris/breath/puddle/redundant lift [delete as necessary]," they'll say. "Well I wondered about doing that."

He makes art out in the world with what comes to hand - ordinary things you find lying about the place; he makes it look so casual, so easy.  But what he really does is very hard - or at least, very rare.  He takes those fleeting thoughts that pass almost unnoticed through everyone's head and makes you notice them. He catches hold of them, and turns them into something profound and resonant. The resulting artefacts are no more complex than they need to be - yet hugely thought provoking.  And he does it time and again.

My own story is that, back on my degree course, I worked with dust for a while, examining it forensically to look at the history of everything in it.  I made photograms of dust (Orozco, it turned out, made far more beautiful etchings), I collected and displayed it (but not as poignantly as he does with Lintels his hung mats of hair and dust), and I rolled sticky balls around to gather it from the floor. Only at the end of this process did I discover Orozco's Yielding Stone, a Plasticine ball of his own weight that he rolled around the streets of New York. It was one of those moments when you feel both the warmth of a kindred spirit and the dismay of knowing you've been fair and squarely beaten to it by a better artist. 

Now I've been to the exhibition and felt it all over again. Gabriel Orozco - I love him and I hate him.

At Tate Modern, London until 25th April 2011.

Traveller's tales

My response to Tim Ellis: The Tourist at Spacex can be found here, along with contributions from other members of the Spacex Review Group. Runs until 30th April.

Meanwhile, my review of The Count of Monte Cristo, Island of True Stories at Exeter Phoenix Galleries, featuring works by Annabel Dover, Cathy Lomax, Hayley Lock, Alex Pearl and Mimei Thompson can be found here.  Runs until 15th May.

Spacex, 45 Preston Street, Exeter EX1 1DF
Exeter Phoenix Galleries, Gandy Street, Exeter EX4 3LS

Farewell to all that

Bruce Asbestos We are open (2011)

Went to Plymouth to say goodbye to Project Space 11. This week sees the final show before their initial phase of funding runs out and the project vacates its current premises: a lock-up stall in Plymouth City Market.

During the project's short life, the directors (Beth Emily Richards, Bryony Gillard and Scott Daniels) have packed in an extraordinarily diverse and ambitious range of exhibitions. They're concluding with a show called £171, for which they've commissioned 10 artists from the past year’s programme to invest a percentage of £171 - all that's left of Project Space 11’s budget.

The investments range from donations of artwork, which may appreciate in value, to racing tips (so far, no good), and a consultation with a telephone psychic 'Prospero' , who turns out to have something of an obsession with Richard Branson. There are also free crisps and an empty monitor bracket.  Sad to see it go, but hoping for bigger and better things in the future.


While I was in town, I looked in on on Maddy Pethick's Pineapple Window in studio space DXDX and Amy Houghton's lovely unravelling and unmaking in Hacking Antiques at Plymouth College of Art Gallery, which runs until 23rd April.