[working title]
Stanley Picker Gallery | Kingston University | Kingston Upon Thames | KT1 2OJ
curated | Susanne Clausen | Alun Rowlands
Alexander Brener & Barbara Schurz | Mark Dickenson & Martin Clarke | Volker Eichelmann, Jonathon Faiers & Roland Rust | everything Editorial | Alec Finlay | Salon de Fleurs | Liam Gillick | Henriette Heise| Inventory | Tilo Schulz | Jakob Jakobsen | Pavlo Keretsey | Johnny Spencer | Szuper Gallery | Markus Vater | Christopher Warmington
Symposium | contributions from Matthew Higgs, Nils Norman, Anthony Davies and Johnny Spencer
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Interview | Susanne Clausen | Alun Rowlands | Published on the occasion of [worlking title]
Hans-Ulrich Obrist: Lets begin with the beginning. Because the first time I heard about it was when I got this very puzzling and personal- impersonal postcard signed by someone I did not know which arrived towards the end of last year. How did it all start? I would then like to know about the project, about the history of how the collaboration started, how the two of you met. Both of you have been working in sort of different collaborations with different artists. 1
S.C. & A.R: We were both aware of each other's involvement in Szuper Gallery and Arthur R. Rose respectively. Working within the same institution placed us both in a position whereby we had an opportunity to realise our various discussions. The gallery offered a site that was generic, new, executive and geographically peripheral. We wanted to transform its prosaic existence through offering it as a support system for personal engagement, production of new work and to address the models by which we recognise art. We attempted to pass over the burden of former concerns in favour of building a more relaxed, complex relationship with art, society and audience. Within this approach there is no either/ or between the gallery/ institution and any other context. Institutional critique and its contiguous discourses have washed up and been absorbed. Here, it is no longer wearily aggressive but has an elasticity and social sensibility. We think this fluency allows collaboration as the work functions and reaches its audience by piggy backing the existing institution. This was established early on in our initial meetings.
Maria Lind: At this first meeting did you already discuss how you would work together, what kind of method you would use? 2
S.C. & A.R: Our prevailing attitude in forming this situation was to fictionalise the series of relations constructed. This use of fiction appears as a diversion from the object while trying to promote discussion and produce something more solvent. Our conversations centred on introducing artists and work to reach points of agreement or contestation. The exhibition would always remain a 'possibility', mutating and drifting across the rules that govern the demarcation of the model, before disappearing.
Rosetta Brooks: It seems symptomatic of an artistic climate withdrawing from the world and making the [gallery] immediate reality of one's art. Is this just a reaction to a depressing situation…? 3
S.C. & A.R: It could be suggested that the routine task of the artist is to bring forth objects for perusal, representation and possible acquisition by collectors. The endless intention to produce and supply has resulted in saturation, monotony and homogeny. [working title] discloses how some artists are persistently looking to be active and precipitate change across a social and political field. We think that many of works and projects highlight the fragile nature of the narrative structures we use to support our own beliefs. The gallery/ institution, therefore, becomes just another vector within the imaginary. The various projects work as independent constructions, with a separate chronology, subjective conditions and, paradoxically, stand for an inevitable deficiency… The artists involved often require public participation in the production of the work that centres their practice at the interces of invention and reception. This locality is not dominated by the need to legitimise art for the marketplace, where authorship is unimportant and exchange value almost non-existent.
Francesco Bonami: Art, in a sense, is obsolete. It is slow to be updated, especially since, at the end of the day, the same criteria and systems return to the fore… Do you think new institutions from outside can be grafted onto the contemporary art world? 4
S.C. & A.R: It is, perhaps, difficult to grasp art beyond a matrix of socio-economic and historical contexts that dictate our codes of practice. The critical interventionist's of the 1970's led the way for the development of new dialogue and performative practices that engaged audiences in active reflection. Today, there has been a shift in character, a migration through invitation, from outside agitators to inside operators… Regarding 'speed' we can recognise that a number of projects are durational and necessitate a slower and more modest intrusion. This lack of speed in comparison with other societal systems, in some ways, is their strength. Simultaneously, mobility and navigation appear as vital qualities in locating positions and creating awareness within this territory...
Within [working title] there is evidence of resistance, through default, to an overriding order. Amidst the undercurrent, perhaps, we can operate as an interruptive device, a jolt, to the flow of things. [working title] does not propose that a new network will arise. It seeks to avoid established conventions in favour of some form of engagement that designates change.
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1 Q. from 'Cities on the move: from Bangkok to Vienna in a tuk tuk' Hans Ulrich Obrist & Hon Hanru. p.1
2 Q. from 'Blind Date' converstaion between Susanne Gaensheimer, Maria Lind, Ann Lislegard & Olaf Nicolai. p.1
3 Q. from ZG. Issue 1. 1980
4 Q. from Flash Art, summer 1998. Giancarlo Politi & Helena Kontova talk with Francesco Bonami. p.101
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