Week 6 - Provocations Presentation - Tue 29.10.2019

A performance presentation - I took on the role of an insurance sales person from the 'no win-no fee' claim adverts

Insurance script ~ entanglement, interruptions and collisions:

Do you like to go to exhibitions and interact with the artwork? Are you concerned about your safety in public exhibitions? Have you tripped, fallen or suffered trauma as a result of an artwork? If so, you can sue the artist, gallery or installer and close the exhibition down to keep others safe.

If you've suffered a personal injury or been made ill while experiencing an artwork, you may be entitled to compensation. It doesn't matter whether you were at fault, generally not exercising common sense or following the rules of engagement, we're here to help sue the artist on your behalf, disregard the artist’s intentions and ruin the experience of the work for future audiences. Talk to us about the possibility of making a personal injury claim under a No Win No Fee agreement.

We began our practice of closing down exhibitions to protect the audience in 1971 with Richard Morris’s Bodyspacemotionthings, an interactive display of rope swings, logs, seesaws and concrete tubes; it was closed after 4 days due to visitors experiencing rope burns, splinters and bruises. Tate resurrected the exhibition in 2009, this time 23 people were injured but Tate’s medical team were on hand. http://mentalfloss.com/article/27440/9-really-dangerous-pieces-art

Personal injuries can happen in many different unexpected ways. Most of the time in public exhibitions it will be due to misuse of an object, or lack of personal awareness, such as Doris Salcedo’s Shibboleth (2007), a large tear was gouged out of the gallery floor, 15 audiences members tripped or fell in to the large void, 4 were severe enough to claim for compensation. Regardless of the fact it was their own negligence to blame they still made a claim towards the gallery and the artist.

A personal injury isn't always visible like a bruise or a broken bone; the words 'personal injury' describe many different types of harm that can befall you in your daily life. That's why our personal injury solicitors are experienced in dealing with everything from slips and trips to issues of migraine and headache. Recently audience members have been complaining about artworks making use of florescent and strobe lighting. Although the gallery has placed a disclaimer on the wall and addressed the issue, they still believe that these art works should be more well guarded or not shown at all. https://hyperallergic.com/484150/art-spaces-should-be-more-mindful-about-their-use-of-strobe-lights/

Everyone is entitled to go about their everyday life in safety. Unfortunately, the fact is that every year a couple of people are injured or made ill by their own carelessness or negligence when participating in a public artwork. When an incident occurs which causes them to be injured or become ill, they may be able to claim the art work is at fault and raise a press storm to push for compensation.

In short, if you've sustained a personal injury that was your fault - even if you were partly at fault – you can probably cause a gallery to stop others from further enjoying that art work in the manner intended. Talk to the gallery today about making art a non-experiential medium, view it from the safety of your barriered off distance, cloud the intentions of the artist with claims of safety and public risk. This is the circumstances behind Ai Wei Wei’s sunflower seeds, a work that was intended for emersion, for walking. Fear was raised regarding dust particles and the exhibit became ‘view only’. https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/news/dust-up-at-tate-modern-as-curse-of-turbine-hall-strikes-again-2108191.html

Every personal injury claim is different, as is the level of education and common sense present within the art world audience so the final figure of compensation you might receive and whether the artwork remains on display depends on a number of factors such as the severity of your injuries, how famous the artist is, and how much press the controversy will bring about.

If you want to ruin the experience of public installation art for future audiences, continue to behave in an erratic manner, hold complete disregard for the artist’s intentions and ignore all health and safety advice given by the gallery. To make your claim call: 800 KeepArtBoring. 

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/visitor-injured-on-first-day-of-tate-black-hole-exhibit-6783094.html

https://www.slatergordon.co.uk/personal-injury-claim/

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=accident+claim+advert

http://mentalfloss.com/article/27440/9-really-dangerous-pieces-art

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturenews/8290076/Tate-Moderns-sunflower-seeds-contain-lead.html

Article on Hyperallergic - Art Spaces Should be More Mindful About Their Use of Strobe Lights

https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/news/dust-up-at-tate-modern-as-curse-of-turbine-hall-strikes-again-2108191.html

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturenews/8067119/Tate-Modern-closes-sunflower-seed-exhibit-to-the-public.html

I dressed for the event but the internet connection was weak and I had to perform it as an audio piece only.

19.10.2019 - a deserted village in the desert

Once a home, now a hotspot for budding photographers and tourists searching for that 'epic' photo that looks just like the other 80 taken that week.

As we walk I see edges, of stone, of doorways, frames preparing the vignette for the perfect shot. There are squares, cubes, rectangles, and grids. Oh the grids; tiles, bricks, roof linings and wall structures. Clarity among the chaos of dilapidated buildings being worn away by foot fall and flash guns.

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18.10.2019 - painting - layer - process

Multiple canvases worked on at once. Process and practicality merge. The materials surrender to each surface independently; the kilter of the ground, the shade from the sun, the previous layers of tone transferring their narratives on the new encounter. My weight is present, my fingers move the pigments, my hands flush their density with water and draw the liquids away with tissue. These pieces are not about me but I am contained within them.

This pieces surrenders itself once more. Layers mesh, masking the previous tales; the events to be forgotten, sneaking through gaps like aged memories flashing by with hints of fragrance or tastes on the tongue.

We sometimes make awful work demands to be revisited. Its shame screams so loud from the edge of my desk I can't take it any longer and ply it with acrylic, locking down its torment in tonal grids of fractured patterns.

Week 4 - Student Meetings - Tue 15.10.2019

we have been discussing via Whatsapp, a not-so-smooth start as we could not agree on a consistent route. Three is a tough number to debate in, but we managed.

Discussion topics:

Entanglement, interference and collision. 

MC and I had similar starting points: interference and entanglement. I’m currently projecting to work with lighting, possibly strobe. Reading about light artworks there have been issues with members of the public suffering from migraines and even seizures. So my thoughts are, arts interfering with the public, do artists have a right to show work irrelevant of its accessibility to all. Should the artist be allowed to ‘interfere’ with the public in a physical sense?

To disorientate, discombobulated, in the physical sense or to argue that artists shouldn’t interfere and we have no place to.

My thoughts were that we need to find our anger

I’m feeling that we need to find our ‘anger’ regarding what provokes us in our art-making. Where does the passion lie, how does that relate to entanglement, interference and collision?

For me, I am passionate about how the audience experiences art, I feel that art can move people when they become a part of it, immersion or activity.

I get ‘angry’ when an artist doesn’t consider the audience or says that it doesn’t matter. I appreciate that art has different meanings for many, by my passion is in the movement and emotion in the audience. I want to provoke something in them, even if it’s discomfort or anxiety. This does apply to 2D work as well as sculpture and performance, I feel that you can be moved or made uncomfortable by an object.

Art and Audience - Emma Wilcox - TEDxNJIT - art experiences are no longer viewed as an exchange between equals - it loses its magic - 

MC was happy to counter that argument and say that artists need to be careful and have no right to challenge people, provoke them etc. That artists can overstep the line, to distinguish the lines between ok conduct as an artist and not ok conduct as an artist and make some distinction to say that some artists have crossed the line and that is not ok of them. People are accountable and just saying it is art is not an excuse

RF looked at these main points: -artists have to interfere with the audience perception so that there can be an engagement with the work. - that it has to be the role of the artist to ’overstep’ because of the need to inform the audience.

13.10.2019 - ladder

In college we had to bring a ladder to class. This ladder became a companion in various creative activities, standing on top of it reciting poetry, dropping paint from it, carrying it with us as we moved around the studio. My ladder was small, I don’t like being at height, I have an urge to step off, to jump.

The last task was to paint a portrait of our ladders. We were given a large roll of paper. I diligently set to work, painting what this ladder meant to me. The background was black and in beautiful detail I rendered a realistic portrait of this tiny ladder at the bottom of the page, 1;1 scale. I was marked down for a lack of creativity as my peers had strewn multi-coloured paint and pattern at their abstract depictions of ladders.

I think about the painting all the time, it was so personal to me, embodying my fears, the discomfort of each task on top of it. The feelings of isolation from the group of creatives pushing the boundaries. My boundaries were pushed but in very different ways that were not considered valid by those in power.

I found a ladder in the store at work. A moment took me and I had to photograph it. The store was in the photo studio so I pulled it out and placed it on the black platform.

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12.10.2019 - paintings, pattern layers - process

I have a book. An ongoing project. Years now. It holds patterns. Some made from memory, some made memories, others from images, most made from its predecessors, layered and subtracted to create something new. Copulations of patterns, children of each other, incestuous.

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Sometimes they are applied to painting. Leaping from the sketchbook as projections. Traced by hand, defects encouraged, manipulating the patterns origins to fit the new landscape.

To save paintings these patterns come as a support team, adding scaffolding to the layers, bridging gaps, filling and creating space, moments, opportunities. Gathering the existing layers under their structures, embracing with their geometric arms.

Added slowly, a game of infiltration. Allowing the layers to settle around their new partners.

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Paint and freedoms of movement are added to other canvases. A family affair as she explores her creativity, not holding on to the imagery she diligently paints over her initial image ‘just like mummy’ as it doesn’t matter, she says, I will always paint more.

I talk to her about permanence and temporality, we discuss if things need to last forever, she thinks this is bad as it will go mouldy so it best if we don’t last for ever. But she will miss us when we are gone. A brief hug and she continues to blank out her images with grey paint ‘to help mummy’

09.10.2019 - sometimes we make awful work

An urge, normally ignored, materials need to be touched, their texture satisfies. Grainy powders smoothed with moisture and movement, applied to board that yields control of its taut surface under the dampness.

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The process satisfies but it’s outcomes leaves the desire for more. A disappointing display, a performance that enticed and result that is lack lustre. Sometimes we make awful work. Its left like a dirty secret in the piles on studio desks, at the back of sketchbooks, placed in bins to be removed. Despicable that our hands create something unwanted.

The words added from a collect pile for colour and became an poem similar to high school attempts. The words float around, there is something here but it needs to be coached. Perhaps a new approach.

I turn to sound. Reading and repeating the words. It’s late. They are asleep. I whisper these words of betrayal. Layering them in the manner my mis-functioning mind layers and collates my thoughts and worries, meddling until some clarity appears.

Sometime we make awful work
Reverse considerations
Can part a moments
Unpredictable history
Conflicts came between
Unceasing patterns
And past
What should
Without possible attempt
An aborted message be

07.10.2019 - collage word poetry

Collect words
No meaning intended
Typefaces draw me in
Font fable fondle my eyes
I pile them
Holding them, like precious stones
Mountain like they form on paper
A breeze scatters them and meaning is found
Is meaning found?
Perhaps
It’s wanted so it appears.

Tidied up, grabbed at will. This is nonsense , the mind seeks meaning and random is ignored. Sentences constructed are nonsensical sense. The hand, the eye, the mind betray me and work together to build structures I don’t want.

The of fit and on biggest and all bikes
bra and conflicts its i aborted moments patterns hold between
speaks about drip I believe video of big few with about
beauty are follow of in came doors
of doors was paint the and cream do
a by and re in an a the the in to.

favourites carefully need
man it. like
part saw new
the interior and I can't juxtaposition
house and public all you
of blue film can is
the of (very) lights
come art at.

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Lay them all out, as an observer, drink them in, ad taxonomies at will, basic and traceable. And still the mind finds meaning where none is intended. Such is the everyday, perhaps life has no meaning but we find it anyway, in love, in movement, in sound and in symbols.

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myth can time simplified to new artists can't come by oldest out
tricked carefully came, coming, watch writers need juxtaposition like out worshippers blue consideration history project man for fun
when appreciation giant very taking reverse reflections tiles new curated.