PAR+RS Blogs

Thank you!

Rocca Gutteridge — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:04:41 GMT

Thank you for all the contributions at last nights artachat session. a podcast and written summary will be available to use from this website and the PAR +RS blog by Friday.

Upcoming Artachat

Rocca Gutteridge — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:03:18 GMT

‘We don’t need no gallery education’
In Conversation with Stacy Boldrick, Research and Interpretation manager at the Fruitmarket gallery.

This Artachat session is focused around the current state of gallery education and aims to explore the following issues:

i) What do we mean by the term education in a contemporary art context?

ii) Is gallery education always necessary?

iii) Why are gallery education programmes sometimes seen as an ‘add on’ to an exhibition?

iii) What ways can we ensure that education is an integrated, innovative and vital part of a galleries programme?

Due to limited capacity in the cafe please email roccagutteridge@yahoo.co.uk to confirm a place for the event

"To Studio... and Beyond"

Rocca Gutteridge — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 08:28:45 GMT

This Artachat session, led by Art Link director Jan-Bert Van den Berg and artists Jonathan Owen and Yvonne Mullock, aims to explore the crossover from an artists studio based practice to when working in a more collaborative, socially engaged way.

The session will begin with an introduction into both the artists and Art Links practice and then continue to explore both the relevance, benefits and challenges that this crossover in practice can bring.

Please join us, at the Word of Mouth, with the usual half price baking deal, for this informative, yet informal Artachat.

Due to limited space, please email roccagutteridge@yahoo.co.uk to reserve a place

Things get bigger

Shelly Nadashi — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:39:03 GMT

Don’t be shy people, comment comment and comment more. Lila de Magalhaes is staring!

"Beyond Doctor Who and dinosaurs even."

Ruth Barker — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:22:24 GMT

Hello,

Just a link this time.

Artes Mundi prize contenders’ art goes on show: Eight artists shortlisted for UK’s richest visual arts prize.

More later,
R

new hospital art

Ben Spencer — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 10:51:47 GMT

Health services in NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (NHSGGC) are undergoing a radical transformation to meet the changing needs of the population. £750million investment in acute hospital services means radical changes to Greater Glasgow and Clyde’s healthcare services. The NHS is building new hospitals and redesigning the way patient services are delivered to provide modern healthcare, in fit-for-purpose buildings.

NHSGGC understands good health and well-being involves a holistic approach which includes thinking about art and therapeutic design in the look and feel of a place – the emotional environment. Nutrition, exercise, access to faster diagnosis and medical treatment are all recognised as vital to people’s health. There is a growing body of evidence which suggests environments designed to support positive emotions contribute to good health and wellbeing too.

Two new hospitals, located at the Stobhill Hospital and Victoria Infirmary sites, opened in 2009 – purpose-designed to deliver outpatient, diagnosis, day surgery and minor injuries care. Both developments included significant allowances for the involvement of artists.

The story of NHSGGC arts projects is summarised by Jackie Sands, Health Improvement Senior: Arts and Health: “Imagining Art strategies into new Hospitals Health Centres involves a strategic approach where plans are implemented in phases in line with build schedules, timeline, local regeneration plans, affordability and aspirations.” Indeed, this process was initiated with the appointment of Jackie Sands to the post of NHS Strategic Arts and Health Co-ordinator in 2005. This post was assimilated into the Health Improvement structure within Acute Planning in October 2008, signalling a commitment from NHSGGC to integrating art and creativity into healthcare.

The direct and tangible outcomes of this commitment, in addition to the creation of permanent artworks at the new Stobhill and Victoria Hospitals, include increased confidence within the NHS to support art projects and the allocation of NHS staff time / investment to subsequent projects: New South Glasgow Hospitals project, Maternity Extension, Drumchapel Child Therapy Centre, Barrhead and Renfrew Health Centres. The continuation of the Strategic Arts Co-ordinator post has been instrumental in setting up structures and mechanisms for involving NHS staff, partner and community stake-holders in the development of art strategies; art sector capacity building, contracts and procurement; fundraising of approx. £1.4m; and contributing to the development of the NHSGGC Design Action Plan.

Whilst recognising the very considerable achievements of the Health Improvement team, this reflection however concentrates mainly on the investment in artworks at the Stobhill Hospital and Victoria Infirmary sites only. Both projects received a single research and development grant from the Scottish Arts Council’s Artists Work in Public Places scheme in 2006 and subsequent, separate grants for their implementation in 2008. The value of the New Stobhill and New Victoria hospitals art and architecture programme is estimated to be in the region of £600,000.

BACKGROUND

The proposals for the involvement of artists at the new hospitals were put together as two distinct packages – with very different approaches. The period, and method, of development was widely divergent, although the timescale for delivery on-site was largely contemporaneous and therefore the two projects were somewhat inevitably considered as a single programme. Indeed, a single Public Art Manager was appointed to oversee the production and implementation of the artists’ work at both sites.

One issue impinged significantly on both projects – the procurement of both hospitals through the private finance initiative / public private partnership (PFI / PPP). This probably had more impact at the New Victoria Hospital where the schedule saw the architectural design scheme signed off before the arts strategy was approved. The PFI / PPP framework raises difficulties because the design scheme and costs are fixed within the capital contract – everything has to be pre-planned, as measurable and quantifiable output specifications, otherwise the client is penalised through inflated costs for additional works.

The art and architecture proposals at both hospitals were developed in collaboration with the architects, artists, NHS Strategic Arts and Health Co-ordinator, NHS Art, Architecture and Environment Steering Group and relevant local reference groups. Both projects also benefited from the involvement of Juliet Dean of public art agency PACE through the research and development phase. Again however because the project at the New Victoria Hospital was less advanced, Dean was more involved in developing a vision for the project at the Victoria Infirmary site and for promoting the art and architecture dialogue.

At Stobhill Hospital Reiach and Hall were appointed as project architects, selecting Thomas A Clark as lead artist for the project based on previous experience of working with him. The architects began a conversation with Clark in 2001 about art – architecture – health and therefore the artwork is integral to the design scheme. Together a concept for the hospital was developed entitled ‘Grove: a grove of larch in a forest of birch’ which is realised by setting the hospital within a large planting of silver birch and planting larch within internal courtyards through the building. These courtyards are also surfaced with natural larch boarding. Clark produced a unifying text to elucidate the theme and this informed the development of additional proposals by visual artists Andreas Karl Schultz, Donald Urquhart, Kenneth Dingwall and Olwen Shone – selected and curated by Clark. Alec Finaly was appointed to undertake a related community engagement project in Springburn Park.

At the New Victoria Hospital, PACE developed the project during the initial research phase, working with HLM, the project architects, to appoint Ally Wallace as lead artist and to develop a vision for the project, namely: the hospital in the park. The idea was to work in place as sustainably as possible in an historical, cultural and locally connected way. Work to bring the ‘outside in’ in a literal, metaphorical, cultural and historical sense; take the ‘old to the new’. A team of visual artists was appointed through an open selection process, comprising: Ally Wallace (lead artist), Hanneline Visnes, Calum Stirling, Jacki Parry and Ronnie Heeps.

Chris Fremantle was appointed as Public Art Manager across both projects in April 2008.

THE ART PROJECTS

New Stobhill Hospital

Clinic Waiting Areas, Thomas A Clark, Andreas Karl Schulze, Olwen Stone
In 15 waiting rooms which look out onto courtyards, the Latin names of trees are sandblasted onto the windows. The walls are decorated by bands of colour installed by Schulze. Each waiting room also contains a video on a woodland theme by Stone (displayed on a monitor).

Six Rooms, Thomas A Clark
In six sub-waiting areas at the south elevation on the first and second floors, the name of a single bufferfly is placed centrally on a wall, painted in appropriate colours: ‘orange tip’ in white and orange, ‘speckled wood’ in green and yellow etc.

Selected Grasses, Thomas A Clark, Olwen Stone
In the Day Surgery waiting area, a poem of the names of selected common grasses scrolls across an LED sign. A related video is projected onto a frosted screen between the waiting area and central arcade.

Day Surgery sub-waiting Areas, Kenneth Dingwall
Groups of shallow relief constructions, in multiples of six or twelve, of primary or high-keyed colour relationships to create visual permutations of colour sequences and pattern of visual rhythms.

Imaging Waiting Area, Thomas A Clark, Kenneth Dingwall
Level one corridor with natural roof lighting, Clark places ‘blue sky’ texts on the wall accompanied by a series of low relief shaped works by Dingwall. The shapes in varied blue hues and placed on the ceiling or wall angles, optically change depending on position or approach.

Endoscopy sub-waiting Areas, Kenneth Dingwall
Groups of multi-angled, low reliefs in monochrome or two colour.

Six Landscapes, Thomas A Clark, Donald Urquhart
In five of the reception/waiting areas with no external view, Urquhart will install works collaboratively with, and in response to, texts by Clark. At each location Urquhart’s work, comprising a flat rectangle of colour with a painting ‘on top’, is sited on one wall with the text on another; e.g. “a deposit of mist moss”

An Alphabet, Donald Urquhart
On level three, at the top of the central staircase, 18 framed drawings will be hung around the landing which provides access to staff areas. Each drawing is in the form of a diptych: the left panel holds a single letter whilst the right hand panel comprises imagery of a species of indigenous tree. This work is based on the Gaelic alphabet which contains 18 letters – each traditionally associated with a tree name.

Glade, Thomas A Clark, Donald Urquhart
Design by Urquhart, in response to a text by Clark, of two adjacent rooms on the ground floor, accessed directly form the arcade, for use by the Spiritual Care Department.

External Benches, Thomas A Clark
To the right of the main entrance, three stone benches each bearing a one-line inscription: in good company | in your own company | in the company of trees.

New Victoria Hospital

Car Park, Ally Wallace
Entrances to the main building, from the lower level car park, are highlighted with large scale wall markings and supergraphic signage.

Coloured Glazing, Ally Wallace
Throughout the building, panels of colour glass are introduced into the curtain wall glazing along the circulation areas to diffuse coloured light into the interior.

Squaring of the Circle, Ronnie Heeps
Design by Heeps for a Spiritual Faith and Healing Room, to provide a sanctuary space for patients and staff, through the use of circular motif to subert the squareness of the room.

Waiting Areas, Jacki Parry
Two adjacent waiting areas in the Outpatients Dept. and the Endoscopy waiting area are the site for Parry’s work – a series of nine small 3D objects, three in each waiting area. Each object is cast in paper and sealed in a ‘display pod’ – a transparent vacuum-formed oval container.

Thresholds and Prospects, Calum Stirling
At the junction of footpaths outside the hospital, Stirling has created a sculpture garden of various natural and manufactured forms. The scheme comprises trees and other planting, boulders, architectural cast pieces, a screen and sculptural seating.

Waiting Areas, Hanneline Visnes
A series of murals drawing on imagery from nature, in waiting areas on each floor, painted over a fairly large area of the wall but with an emphasis on detail.

Programmable spaces

Both hospitals have provision for programmable spaces for ‘community arts projects’ and touring exhibitions. Public areas have been identified within each building and provided with the means to receive artwork on a changing basis. The intention is to implement a continuous exhibition and commissioning programme of therapeutic arts and health improvement work, led by artists working with staff and community groups. Work generated through these interventions will be displayed in the designated, programmable areas. This is a particular feature of the New Victoria Hospital where resources for a 2-3year development programme to animate these spaces is built into the art project budget.

EDUCATION and OUTREACH

A community engagement project, at Stobhill, was undertaken by Alec Finlay with the Friends of Springburn Park. ‘Home for a King’ or ‘waiting room in the park’ is the result: a new entrance to the park opened up and marked with a Moon Gate. Boulders engraved with poetry, a bird box walk and additional benches seek to draw people further into the natural environment.

An overarching outreach programme, Widening the Circle, was also implemented with the aim of extending the knowledge and experience of members of the Steering Groups to other members of staff in the hospitals. In addition, the Arts & Health team have guided tours of the artworks. Further Interpretation and publications are proposed for both hospitals.

Allowances for education programmes (talks and workshops) were included in the original project budgets. For example, it is understood an artwork facilitated by Art in Hospital Artists working with hospital patients and local school children went up on the site hoardings in autumn 2007.

REFLECTION

Both projects demonstrate how artists can help the NHS develop an overall design vision for a new building, in creative ways. The approach at each site however varied widely, the result of different circumstances and the divergence of approach in the procurement of each new hospital. The impact of the artists’ interventions similarly therefore differs considerably. It is incredibly illuminating however to list all the art works as a way of noting the considerable achievement of NHSGGC in investing in artists’ work, as part of the redevelopment of the hospital estate, particularly given the size of NHSGGC as an organisation and the potential for this work to be completely marginalised.

In discussion with NHS staff, a criticism of the more conceptual and cerebral approach to the artwork programme at Stobhill is that it doesn’t particularly relate to the community, although the question remains as to ‘what is the community’. The work may also be considered too small, in some cases, for the scale of the new hospital spaces. The programme at Stobhill does however have considerable rigour and coherence, with all the artists responding to a clear statement of intent. The works are composed together, in dialogue with one another, and not separately as stand alone works. The exception perhaps is Alec Finlay’s intervention which appears rather more independent. The work is however outwith the new hospital building and the result of a separate community engagement project developed with the Friends of Springburn Park.

The artwork programme at the New Victoria Hospital appears more populist, although the artworks in themselves are still quite challenging. Perhaps this is because the artists’ interventions are described more easily in terms of traditional practice: painting, sculpture etc. The works exist pretty much in their own right rather than as part of the over-arching vision. The works tend to sit well in the smaller spaces of the New Victoria Hospital. The really innovative part of the New Victoria project is the commitment to the ongoing art programme.

Whilst widely different, to a certain extent it is predictable the two projects were bundled together and this actually appears to be a strength and success of the project. In a sense, the two projects form a type of pilot initiative and the scale of the intervention helps to raise the visibility of the arts and health strategy. The two projects also demonstrate a multiplicity of approaches, a range of different programmes which is hugely appropriate and encouraging – NHSGGC has not adopted a ‘one size fits all’ solution to involving artists in its work. Indeed, the breadth of work has helped to change the language around the art commissioning process and the two projects have been instrumental in building capacity within the Health Improvement team to champion and develop further projects.

In particular, the Arts and Health Co-ordinator sees the artwork programme working strategically to influence the rest of the NHSGGC about:

consideration of emotions and psychological effects of place and spaces in healing;
what it means when artists and designers ‘work in context’;
how NHS based artists and art programmes can be catalysts for facilitating health sector role in neighbourhood and city regeneration;
how NHS can work to support Glasgow City Council’s agenda for widening access to art and cultural activity.

The projects at the Stobhill and Victoria sites have also been hugely important to NHSGGC in demystifying the process of arts commissioning and demonstrating the professionalism of the arts. For many staff it has been “an exciting journey and privilege to work with artists”. As more people get involved in the process, more learning happens and this is seen as being incredibly important. The artists leave and so more and more people need to be involved in the process to ensure it is embedded into NHSGGC’s learning culture – knowledge gained through new work is disseminated, discussed and modifications adapted as a direct result of new practice. For the arts programme this is happening within the NHSGGC Design Champions Group and therefore it can be argued the art interventions at the new hospitals has been instrumental in beginning to influence the whole organisation. A further key achievement is the development of the Glasgow Arts and Health Network where information and learning can be shared.

Having said that some people still have difficulty in understanding artists’ working practice. For example, the research and development phase was considered very expensive – the question of value for money constantly needs to be argued at this stage. Also the artist design sketches were seen as final proposals with little understanding these would need considerable further development to be realised. It was clear that two totally different cultures were crashing together.

NHS Estates has however produced a useful briefing, entlitled: ‘Improving the Patient Experience: The Art of Good Health – A Practical Handbook’ 2003. An extract is available at publicartonline

This paper argues the arts have a significant contribution to make in creating impact in healthcare design. In particular, the arts can be used to:

create local distinctiveness;
ensure that the built environment reflects individual human scale;
meet the spiritual and emotional needs of patients and staff;
support and improve wayfinding, for example by creating landmarks at entrances and in key public spaces;
enhance landscaping and interior design through creative use of materials and finishes;
enhance the prestige and reputation of the NHS trust during the redevelopment process.

The paper goes on to describe the PFI design process and advise on the commissioning of artworks, managing the transfer of existing works of are to a new building and setting service agreements in place for an ongoing arts programme. It is recommended NHS Trusts develop arts strategies and arts development plans as part of the PFI procurement process. Key factors for success are highlighted as:

build consensus early in the process with all stakeholders;
establish an art and design committee, with clear terms of reference;
ensure arts programme is professionally managed;
define scope and parameters of the arts project to quantify the work to minimise risk;
bring specialist arts advisers on board early;
budget for the arts strategy early in the process.

It is recognised the Health Improvement and Capital Planning teams have learnt a huge amount in delivering the projects, but it is not clear whether this learning has been formalised. And ‘how to measure the impact of the projects is crucial to closing the loop’. Significantly the process for the procurement of artwork within new capital developments is now far more sophisticated and artwork is built into the output specifications for any new PFI / PPP contracts / tender documents.

The two projects at Stobhill and the New Victoria Hospital have acted as a real lever to influence NHS staff throughout the organisation. Also the support of the Scottish Arts Council has been instrumental in influencing and supporting NHS policy.

It appears that within only four years, the arts have moved from being considered as a separate agenda into an integral part of the capital planning process through the sustained promotion by the Health Improvement team. This is a truly considerable achievement.

On my 7th day

Shelly Nadashi — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 08:18:51 GMT

Dear readers,

I am in the Schloss Bröllin office now. Complete silence outside, we just finished eating Gulasch; Robert, Yoachim, Ildiko, Lila and myself. Every day we eat two meals together; lunch and dinner. Robert is German, Yoachim too, he is one of the establishers of the place, Ildiko is a Hungarian volunteer, she used to live in Debrezen, which is where my father comes from. Lila is my friend and an artist from Glasgow which I invited to join to this trip.

Yoachim was telling us of how they (I’m not sure exactly who ‘they’ are, perheps a group of theatre makers..) got in to schloss bröllin after the collapse of the soviet union. He described how everything in the east was under valued so you could get land, or other things very easily and cheap. People didn’t know how to price things at that time he said.

I spend my time here mostly on developing a puppetry work. Making the puppet is slow, but I am enjoying this slowness. I imagine the puppet like a mermaid, very sensual at the top part of her body, but nearly paralyzed in her lower part.

Good night,
Shelly

Chapter 1 / The Ring Infection

Shelly Nadashi — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 22:08:08 GMT

Homecoming

Ruth Barker — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 20:45:39 GMT

Hello,

On the train back to Scotland after spending a few days in London (just doing some research for a current project). I went to see the Henry Moore retrospective at Tate Britain, and would heartily recommend it to anyone who (like me) tends to think of Moore in relation to large-scale, contextually conservative, permanent works in front of banks. The show is a great look at the evolution of a sculptural practice that, when seen together like this, demonstrates an incredible articulacy and sensitivity. Completely new to me (probably shamefully) were Moore’s drawings, which I found hugely moving. Also fresh were his war works, and his mining drawings – complicated series of images and forms that still carry an eloquent weight and social power. Good to see.

At the British Museum was a similarly eye-opening exhibition of Mexican printmaking. Titled Revolution on Paper: Mexican prints 1910 – 1960 the exhibition concentrated on lithographs, but it was also good to see the more publicly disseminated side of printmaking represented through the inclusion of posters and book jackets. Coming out of the museum I ran into a friend who had happened upon this graphic intervention. Though very far from revolutionary (!), it was good to see that people are still intervening in their public space.

Other useful stuff I was lucky enough to see included the Chris Ofili show at Tate Britain, and The Kingdom if Ife at the British Museum. It was brilliant to be able to spend a whole day each in both the V&A and the British Museum, studying some of the items in their collections. Amazing but exhausting, a dedicated day-long trip to either one is something that everyone should do at least once, I reckon. I’ll warn you though – you still won’t make it round everything! For the temporary exhibitions though, the Kingdom of Ife is particularly relevant in terms of thinking about the relationships between art-making, culture, and public space. Go see it if you can, and let me know what you think.

While I was away, I was also liaising (cue appreciation of modern technology) with performance artist Shelly Nadashi, who will, I’m very happy to announce be working on PAR+RS’ first ever commissioned artwork. Hooray! As a lead into our Spring / Summer 2010 Temporary Projects Season, Shelly will be devising a series of public performances that will take place in Germany (where she is at the moment), Poland, and Scotland. I’m really pleased that Shelly’s agreed to take on the commission, and I’m thrilled that we’re going to be able to follow her progress in an exclusive Blog. I can’t wait to find out what form her final piece will take!

Anyway, writing this on the train, and great as London always is, I’m also very much looking forward to being back home.

More later,
R

my utopian practice

Jodi Rose — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 18:47:52 GMT

One of the dangers inherent in any creative practice that involves imagining or inventing different possibilities for inhabiting the world is the inevitable gap between what you can imagine and where you are now. I find myself stumbling into this dark abyss more often than is good for me, spinning into a freefall through the empty space in momentary lapses of concentration or focus and landing with a thud on the concrete.

This reminds me somehow of the trip into the wormhole experienced by Jodie Foster in the movie Contact. After listening for alien transmissions and finally picking up and interpreting the signals to build their enormous egg-beater travel machine, the scientist who takes her place on the voyage is subjected to an intense nightmare as he goes into the darkness of his own mind. While our Jodie, in all her innocent goodwill to humanity, goes out into a distant planet where the waves flow backwards on the beach, witnesses a celestial event “It’s so beautiful, so beautiful, they should have sent a poet. I had no idea,” and has a heartfelt talk with her long-dead father. On her return, no-one believes the event took place, as she hasn’t moved from her chair, only the 18 hours or minutes of static recorded on her video camcorder bears testimony to her journey.

A little like The Abyss where Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio goes into the alien depths and experiences an underwater world of such phenomenal beauty and mystical connection, while her evil crew-member is again tormented by nightmarish beasts and apocalyptic visions “It was like a dance of light… it was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. I don’t think they mean us any harm… We all see what we want to see. You have to look with better eyes than that.” Incidentally some gorgeous high tensile cable zings and pows in the soundtrack remind me of something…

So be careful what you wish for – or dream of – when entering mystical other-realms, whatever means you use to get there, it seems they do tend to reflect the state of your own mind.

There is a forum on the fansite for recent film spectacle ‘Avator’ dealing with the post-utopian trauma in thousands of viewers who can’t stand to return to the world after seeing the beauty of this imaginary land, and finding the damage we have done to our own planet unbearable. Ways to cope with the depression of Pandora being intangible and Avatar renders this earthly life meaningless include the following:

“I watched avatar a few weeks ago and I’m feeling depressed and sad. It’s like I want to reach out and be in Pandora. I’d do anything to be in Pandora. I’ve tried so hard to dream about being on Pandora but it hasn’t worked”

“Because you know you can never actually go to Pandora, as it exists only in our imagination… sigh…”

“Start living like Neytiri: in touch with nature, the environment, and not being greedy and wasteful. Don’t get swept away by the wave of negativity, live your dream. Your life has only two switches, to shine or not to shine. There is no “apathy” setting. If you’re on apathy setting you might as well sign your world away to destruction. When you get discouraged by everyone around you, be courageous like Jake, and jump on the leonopteryx. Be the change you want to see in your world. There are only so many people on this earth, the more of them that are doing positive things, the less of them that are out there doing negative things. It’s unfortunate that we live in a world where, just by pulling a trigger or making a corporate decision, one single greedy human being can wipe out the hard works of love of many people. What will our money buy, when everything that is worth having is destroyed? The only way you can fill the emptiness you feel after this movie, is to jump on the leonopteryx."

A friend writes to me today saying ‘I want to live in Bridgeland now’. Take me to your utopia.

I’d quite like to try the method I learned from the nuns hovering over the black stones in the mountain monastery outside Barcelona. In order to access the ‘Vortex of Montserrat’, one simply stands barefoot in the centre of the circle and throw your hands in the air – this apparently causes the energy of the vortex to flow through you and can bring on mystical visions or possibly enlightenment. I didn’t feel it so much, but my friend almost converted then and there. Maybe it works on a bridge too – that circular manhole set into the pavement of the photo on the pont neuf could well be the vortex of Bridgeland. Try it and see!

That’s one way to get connected.

The Suborbital Transport Terminal (Spaceport Berlin) is another. Promising ‘a time-efficient spatial structure which will transport Business Travelers / CEO’s with super speed to any point in the world in less than 2 hours,’ the shuttle is called EVE, ‘Evolution in Elevation’ and glides through the sub orbit, to fly from Berlin to Sydney in 90 minutes. Reminiscent of C-Base project to recreate the spaceship which they believe Berlin is built upon, with portals into the ruins existing in various locations – the Alexanderplatz tower being the central communications and navigation centre.

Friday vernissage Nicolas Wiese show ‘There is Bacteria’ and later an evening of live audiovisual sound performances and videos about transmission and transcoding with incounter and artkillart label (more on the bridge spirit voices vinyl release with them later) at The Tipping Points exhibition in HBC, which promises ‘a shift in consciousness’. I’m trying to get ahead of my schedule so I can go enjoy. Or find a bridge vortex.

“Tipping Points is a new exhibition bringing together artists working across a number of artforms: sculpture, film, sound and performance. The focus of the show is an interrogation of material, media and technology and the ways in which artists exploit these in order to affect viewers perception of their work and the world.

A tipping point is a moment of tension where the future hangs in the balance; where small changes, of context, media, arrangement or reproduction, can have a profound effect upon the resulting work, its form and meaning. Imagine a set of scales in which one grain of sand effects a dramatic shift bringing the measure crashing down on one side of the other.

In an increasingly mediated world Tipping Points engages with the continual transferral and transformation of data. What it brings to this is not a reaffirmation of the general distancing and dehumanisation of our worldly view but an engagement with the distinct texture, grain and shimmer of mediating technologies hi-tech and lo-fi. A glorying in the potential for visual or audio trickery, unexpected beauty and the altering of perspective which these approaches allow. What is at stake is a shift in consciousness."

Berlin No-wave and beyond

Jodi Rose — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 15:27:35 GMT

I had the pleasure of seeing Blank City screening at the Berlinale, an excellent documentary about the no-wave DIY film culture and cinema of transgression in 70’s and 80’s New York. The vibe of everyone starving and making projects together was resonant with the kind of activity happening in Berlin – and Glasgow, although the shift towards gentrification is already well under-way. The film-makers collected an incredibly thorough archive of the works created by an engaging community of artist/musician/actors/directors, which left me wanting to see more of the original material. The interviews with many of the artists were fantastic, Lydia Lunch and Jim Jarmusch in particular giving in-depth commentary and inspiring the get-up-and-do-it style of creating as part of everyday life. It was interesting to see these initial experiments in light of their future careers, and watching the shift from ‘downtown’ to a wider audience – a film showing uptown for the first time! As the commodification of the scene took place along with the ‘clean-up’ of New York streets, the cinema of transgression was born in a conscious attempt to keep life and art on the edge. The artists also spoke of their excitement with the current technological situation where anyone can take the tools of production into their own hands and create whatever they can imagine then distribute it to the world. A democratisation of the production process, although of course access to wider audiences is still mediated and filtered by cultural gatekeepers in various forms.

Later the same afternoon I was taken by some friends visiting from Barcelona to see the latest Bruce laBruce film L.A. ZOMBIE at Peres Projects. It was an intriguing follow-up to the documentary, dark, decadent, debauched – with an astonishingly well-muscled hero/villain porn star roaming the streets and waterways of LA, both as a homeless man and a zombie. The artist writes about how many of the crew dropped out when they managed to find paid work, and so he ended up doing some of the filming himself along with his assistant.

“Now I remember why I love filmmaking. What other pursuit allows you to experience despair and jubilation all in one day, and twice over? Jason picks me up in his trusty Datsun and we head for the lofts on Wilshire where the production office is. Because the big car crash scene has been changed to a location in Topanga Canyon to be shot on Sunday night, we have the opportunity to shoot another full day of Francois in various locations in LA both dressed as a homeless person and as an alien zombie. Sometimes disaster can turn into advantage.

We did have an awesome, experienced First A.D. in place, but he dropped out about a week before shooting when he got a paying gig. A lot of the people who have volunteered to work on this project for little or no money are dropping off like flies because they just can’t afford to turn down other work if it becomes available. I suppose it has something to do with the economy. I guess the economic disaster also explains why there are so many more homeless people than I’ve ever seen in LA."

According to Heidegger, ‘homelessness is coming to be the destiny of the world’, perhaps we all end up metaphysically under the bridge in the ‘oblivion of Being’.

“Due to this negligence of the meaning of Being, man has lost almost all his connections with Being and lives now in a technical, artificial world: man has lost his “ground”, he is “homeless”.
Heidegger also had plenty to say on bridges and the intersections between earth and sky, divinities and mortals… The bridge as a place that creates location, while it divides and connects, there is also the possibility of moving between places, between worlds.

How do we re-establish our connection in relation to Being? I nominate dancing. It’s an age-old practice to invoke being present in the body, and overcoming the absence of ground.

Those people who maintain that art and life should be kept separate may disagree, but I’m always happy to find an unexpected burst of creativity in the midst of everyday life. Whether it takes the form of a forgotten sculpture tucked away into the bypass of a freeway, or a moment of spontaneous performance with random strangers, it’s something I hope to create space for on bridges and beyond…

How do I get to Bridgeland?

Jodi Rose — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 10:15:40 GMT

Good question. I’m still trying to figure that out myself…

Bridgeland is everywhere. Any bridge can take you to Bridgeland. It’s already in existence, there is nothing to create, all we have to do is learn to find our way.

walking in bridgeland – pont neuf, paris january 2010

I’ve been discussing details for the opening event with the wonderful Lowsalt crew, who made another site visit last week and came up with a perfect site for each of the musicians, ingenious technical solutions and deeper concept synthesis of the performance in relation to the location. Now to continue the process of negotiation with council and local authorities. I’m sworn to secrecy on the details, so you’ll just have to come find out what they are on the night. Friday 23rd April, in case you’re reading this in Glasgow. Very excited to be coming in two weeks and getting onto making signs and costumes and music!

On an esoteric level, all those ideas from transmediale and my trip are swirling around in a transtemporal soup going through my mental filtering process. Something about making a transition between times is important, and the idea of perceptual time, non-linear, mythic – all the ways you can experience temporality.

I hear another take on the idea of moving through time in a talk by the ‘agent of displacement’ at NGBK whose main point is that ‘art travels through time’ and hence artists also. While the work is in process it’s alive, once it’s declared ‘finished’ and ‘you’ the artist named as ‘the author’, well then “you’re dealing with a corpse”. He talked about relational art, and seeing through to the other side of the wall, telling a story about his grandmother knocking on their dividing wall every evening to say goodnight, and his failed attempt at 8 to break through the wall, which has informed his entire art practice. Although simple and even a little banal at the time, the idea is still resonating.

What is on the other side of the wall? (or the bridge…) His piece in a Rome exhibition was to show photos of the rooms on the other side of the gallery walls, and in another Italian city, tried to convince the inhabitants of the apartment around the gallery to allow him to bring strangers in to their homes and observe the spaces as part of his artwork. One neighbour, a journalist, agreed and gave him the keys, while another elderly woman reluctantly allowed him to come into her apartment but refused to change any of her habits for his visits. So the gallery audience was brought through in small groups, kept behind velvet ropes as if in a museum, to observe this woman in her home, ironing or cooking or watching TV. He said it was a quite uncomfortable experience, as people tried to connect and say bongiorno, and excuse me, while she completely ignored them; A ‘relational artwork’ that failed to relate. He realised that any relation, even a negative one is still an interaction. I like the image of her steadfastly ironing away while all these art people traipsed through her home – of which she became the star.

Speaking of stars, it has been suggested that a fabulous red satin dress, corset and skyscraper heels form part of my bridge conductors outfit for the opening ceremony. (I’m thinking a tesla coil could be built in somewhere too – maybe on the hat?)

There’s something inherently decadent about dressing-up, it’s one of the reasons I love Glasgow so much, every time I visited for about two years the fantastic Maxwell Park crew had another dress-up party, and everyone went to such extravagant efforts to transform themselves and create a magical playground – with dancing! Becky just gave me the coolest opera and diva costume places in town, and I’m thinking that everyone needs to make or find an outfit to enter Bridgeland.

The Bruce Sterling idea of simply dressing up and inhabiting the future world in which you would like to live has taken hold here! There’s such a joyful celebratory feeling created by a whole lot of people in outrageous costumes. One of my favourite short films at transmediale was ‘permanent residents’, with a series of LA inhabitants in wonderfully bizarre outfits going about their daily life, from the laundromat to vacuuming the house, looking extreme and extraordinary. I think we can make this event spectacular and amazing, taking our wildest sartorial fantasies to the streets and celebrate crossing into Bridgeland.

700 brides for 700 bridges – pont battant, sonorama besançon 2009

So, get your sewing machines out, it’s needles at dawn! Ok, well maybe sunset.

Swinging

Ruth Barker — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 13:46:34 GMT

Hello,

just saw this on the bbc website. Seems Christoph Büchel has raised some eyebrows (at least) with his new project at The Secession in Vienna.

In a slight departure from previous works I’ve seen, rather than creating an installative ‘hyper-real’ environment within a gallery (see here for an example of Hole at Kunsthalle Basel ) Büchel has this time re-sited an existing real space within the gallery context. Specifically he’s installed Element6, a pre-existing nightclub (or sex club – accounts vary), which is normally located elsewhere in the city of Vienna, inside the gallery space. The club will be open at night when the gallery is closed. During the day visitors to the gallery will have to walk through the club (which will then be closed, and empty of staff and patrons) to reach The Secession’s basement, where they’ll be able to view the Beethoven Frieze by Gustav Klimt. Beethoven Frieze is the wall painting Klimt produced in 1902 for the Vienna Secessionist exhibition. Intended as a temporary commission, the work was later retained and restored. Significantly for Büchel, Klimt’s mural was originally attacked as being pornographic, but has since become lauded as a civic ‘masterpiece’.

Two things obviously interesting here: One is the switch between a work that was intended to be permanent, which is then kept as a precious object for posterity. Ginny? Any thoughts? ¹

The second is the nature of public space. The working definition of public art that I use for PAR+RS is ‘art practice that is not contextualised by a gallery or museum.’ Büchel’s work here interests me because it injects some friction to this idea. What happens when we re-contextualise the gallery itself, and temporarily lend it another function?

More later,
R

¹ Ginny Hutchison produced Seven Sunsets for Inverness city centre – a temporary commission that was then criticisedin the press for its very ephemerality. See previous Blog posts and comments.

transmediale 10 no. 2

Jodi Rose — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 10:19:19 GMT

Second day of transmedialala and I’ve already reached fuzzy festival saturation overload. The morning session of presentations and panel discussion about ‘creativity as an economic resource’ skirted around the issues of creating a different cultural economic model, with stories of three successful creative enterprises pitted against the seriously pessimistic academic reading of capital and creativity. Feudalism, rich white knights and the exploitation of your own labour resources were all touched on, without really exploring in depth any of the more interesting points that were raised, particularly about strategies for creating sustainable alternatives in a micro-economic scale.

Next is ‘Processual Media Art and Theory’ and/or Agit Prop – Art.

“We have no future because our present is too volatile. … The spinning of the given moment’s scenarios. Pattern recognition.” [William Gibson, Pattern Recognition, 2003]

Last night’s “Pattern Recognition” concert was a cacophony of white noise and minimalist drone…
both of which I enjoy in moderation and depending on context.

The first peformance ‘Materia Obscura’, had a distinctly soporific effect, endlessly mutating imagery reminiscent of renaissance paint merging into a burning desert with accompanying transcendental music. The second piece, ‘Test Pattern’ was a wildly energetic abstract static and glitch extravaganza, melding the low deep beats with high frequency bleeps to create a satisfying immersion into the black & white world of Riyoji Ikeda. The overall effect left me unable to contemplate attending the OM deathmetal show at Club Transmediale, although I’m told that it was quite hypnotic, and somehow failed to notice that my favourite eclectic Berlin DJ, Markus Detmer of Staubgold was also playing.

I went back to visit the sexy immersive sound-helmet, but was foiled by a long and slow-moving queue waiting to experience the work. Today the fly-catching robots caught my attention – beautifully realised and quirky designs matching the concept.

So the plan is to fill out the names and add the links later…

Looking at ‘white noise’ magnetic tape installation by Zilvinas Kempinas

transmediale 10 no. 1

Jodi Rose — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 10:18:49 GMT

I’m finally drinking my slow espresso – cooked on an iron – at the ‘feral trade’ cafe in the foyer of the haus de kulturen der welt venue for Transmediale Futurity Now. After a quick spin around the exhibition my head is whirling with papparazzi robots, the artifical full moon suspended in an Italian piazza by Chinese artist Wang, Yuyang and the gorgeous imaginary low-tech system for vision transfer sending every individual pixel of an image through a copper cable onto a grid panel. The cutting edge of media art and cultural economics are represented in both the artists, speakers and hundreds of attendees, waiting to dive into the melee of ideas.

Coffe in the Feral Trade Cafe

The session on ‘Phuturama’ I wanted to attend is all in German and the workshop on free culture incubation was booked out, so now I’m about to head into the cinema for a program on ‘Media Personifications’ and latter the ‘Pattern Recognition’ performance.