Prospectus

Interesting given Amy’s interest in weaving.

David Medalla’s work, A Stitch in Time.

During the late 1960’s and early 1970’s Medalla made a series of ‘participation works’ where the audience was encouraged to be involved in the production of playful and experiential pieces which challenged the notions of creative hierarchy.Medalla described the piece as “participation-production-propulsion”. It involves the audience sewing small objects of significance onto a large cloth in a public space, which requires a creative concentration and an engagement with the artwork.

The best of both?!

Courtney

As part of the history group, and to complete the trajectory of the timeline of radical art schools and Chelsea Art School that we are developing, I have invited some artists / architects to contribute drawings of what they consider to be the best future school. Utopian, dream-like, pragmatic, breaching the disciplines of art and architecture, these should provide a great leaping point from history to present and into the future, and between the history group and contemporary group. If anyone has any additional ideas for practitioners please let me know, and if anyone would like to help me define our proposition to the artists that would be great also. 

Lawrence Lek - http://www.lawrencelek.com/
‘Interestingly enough, for my final project in NY I’m developing an urban installation called Zero Bowery // Public Assembly, in which I’m trying to turn the institutional structure of a creative ‘art school’ education inside out, assembling a series of temporary ‘art shelters’ on the Bowery in NYC.’ - He has said that we would be able to display drawings for these.

Viktor Timofeev - http://victortimofeev.com/

Neda Mostavi

Inviting: 

Celine Condorelli - www.celinecondorelli.eu
Practice Architecture
Assemble 

Joseph Kosuth, Information Room (Special Investigation), 1970

James recently blogged about Kosuth’s installation piece, Information Room. I have been trying to gather some documents surrounding this piece and with that have come across some more relevant information. The Information Room (The Third Investigation) (1969) was first shown at the exhibition “Conceptual Art and Conceptual Aspects,” The New York Cultural Center, New York, 10 April-25 August 1970. The installation was also recreated at Sean Kelly Gallery in 2008, exhibition titled, “neither appearance nor illusion”.

Photo Jay Cantor

I also found a written text online, discussing Information Room directly and found this interesting quote mentioning the artwork in relation to students and education:

“…Kosuth’s own reading piece titled “Information Room (Special Investigation)” from 1970. For this conceptual work the artist compiled a library of art historical and theoretical texts and invited viewers to sit and read. Clad with leather wristwatch and vest, the combination of Kosuth’s fashion and his attitude epitomizes the image of rebel youth (pictured above). Rather than make art, he (Kosuth) absorbed ideas. And people watched him as he did it. In the 1970s, the act of reading carried political undertones. Just being a student was a marker of political affiliation during a time when SDS chapters sprouted around the country, and anti-war protests occurred on college campuses.ⁱⁱ Instead of picking up guns and going to war, these students picked up books, consequently widening the divide between blue-collar working class individuals and privileged white-collar students.”

The text also mentions Buzz Spector’s work, who ‘piled books together in a monumental mass reminiscent of minimalist sculpture.’ Although this method of display makes the books much less accessible to the audience, I thought it was an interesting reference point.

Learning Curve (2000) Buzz Spector

Posted by Zinny

Weaving circle (with HINGES!)

Amy

“Let us summarize the principal characteristics of a rhizome: unlike trees or their roots, the rhizome connects any point to any other point, and its traits are not necessarily linked to traits of the same nature; it brings into play very different regimes of signs, and even nonsign states. The rhizome is reducible to neither the One or the multiple. It is not the One that becomes Two or even directly three, four, five etc. It is not a multiple derived from the one, or to which one is added (n+1). It is comprised not of units but of dimensions, or rather directions in motion. It has neither beginning nor end, but always a middle (milieu) from which it grows and which it overspills. It constitutes linear multiplicities with n dimensions having neither subject nor object, which can be laid out on a plane of coinsistency, and from which the one is always subtracted (n-1). When a multiplicity of this kind changes dimension, it necessairly changes in nature as well, undergoes a metamorphisis. Unlike a structure, which is defined by a set of points and positions, the rhizome is made only of lines; lines of segmentarity and stratification as its dimensions, and the line of flight or deterritorialization as the maximum dimension after which the multiplicity undergoes metamorphosis, changes in nature. These lines, or ligaments, should not be confused with lineages of the aborescent type, which are merely localizable linkages between points and positions…Unlike the graphic arts, drawing or photography, unlike tracings, the rhizome pertains to a map that must be produced, constructed, a map that is always detatchable, connectable, reversable, modifiable„ and has multiple entranceways and exits and its own lines of flight.” (see A Thousand Plateaus Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 21)


Shouldn’t our structure then, be projected, reflected and in motion. A ‘disseminating machine’? Using the ‘structure’ to disperse information in a network.

Pliable. Made of a mouldable substance? Use screens to project out information?

Amy

Paul Rooney: Thin Air | Sound and Music

Here is the link to the Paul Rooney s project Thin Air ”The Psycho-Vocalic Discoveries of Alan Smithson, A Work by Paul Rooney” Part academic lecture, part science-fiction story, Paul Rooney excavates real and imagined histories trapped inside Leeds Metropolitan University’s H Building as it faces demolitionThroughout the 1970s, Smithson undertook an extensive sonic study of H Building claiming that the recordings of distant voices he had made in its empty rooms were the remnants of the radical, eventful and tragic episodes that had taken place there. Drawing on Smithson’s recordings and diaries, Dr Annette Gomperts reveals how his findings correlate with specific historical moments in the life of individual students, the site of the building, and the wider world. Thin Air is a 60-minute pre-recorded lecture with visuals and will be presented in the ground floor teaching space within the Broadcasting Place development at specific times over the next year.

If you want to see the booklet it can be found here!

12/03/12

The CONTEMPORARY WORKING GROUP:  MEETING. 1

Aim of group: Bringing contemporary artists to contribute/collaborate with the project.

Discussed the possibility of artist work to be exhibited, combined within the archive time line/structure. Merged contemporary and historical.

Read the meeting notes

07/03/2012

We had a lively meeting, concrete ideas exchanged, and working groups formed!

Read the descriptive meeting notes 

Here are the Working Groups:

I mentioned today some of the display methods that Rotor used in the recent OMA exhibition at the Barbican. I thought it might be useful to post on the blog, photographs of the techniques used as it might help us to visualise how we want to (or indeed how we do not want to) display the material that we are beginning to gather.

- Own Photograph

Above is a timeline of OMA’s architectural projects that the visiting audience could interact with by sifting through the different material. Each project was hung on a sliding rail which presented itself as engaging way to explore and discover information, while still maintaining a chronological order which is characteristic of a time line.

- Own Photograph

An archival room, similar in display to the exhibition, Avalanche 1970-1976 at CHELSEA Space that Donald Smith showed pictures of to MA Curating not so long ago. Basic idea of copying material and/or using originals to paste directly onto the wall.

- Own Photograph

Lastly, the idea of tear-off sheets attached to gallery walls (or any other surface), from which the audience can then pick ‘n’ mix regarding the material provided. I’m sorry for the size of the picture with minimal detail of this concept, but if you imagine a thick pad of paper that you tear sheets from - this is the general idea. Bloomberg Space also use this idea for their press releases. Very simple.

Zinny

Just found some interesting information and images of the panopticon and Millbank Penitentiary at this Tradescant blog, which has an amazing photograph from 1891 of the pantopticon from the air

Some excavation works were carried out at the site from 2001 to 2004, read the report.pdf .There is some interesting information, and it shows exactly where the panopticon was situated underneath the college parade ground.

Daisy

29th February 2012

Hello everyone,

I have just uploaded to the drop box the audio from last weeks lecture with Malcolm Quinn. If anyone still needs to join the drop box and has lost the email inviting them, just let me know and I will re-invite you.

Zinny

Fresno Feminist Art Program / Experiment

In terms of bringing a tangible object to suggest for tomorrows seminar, I have been researching the Fresno Feminist Art Program / Experiment which was founded in 1970 and became a full 15 unit program in 1971. It was founded by Judy Chicago and was an experiment in the sense that it removed the 15 students from the traditional art school format. They created “A Studio Of Their Own” in whoich they could engage with new formats of collaboration and dialogue as well as honing skills in non-traditional media such as performance and costume. These were all experimental ideas at the time, especially the notion of a space which was accessible “without male interference”.

This experiment was the precursor to projects such as Womanhouse, which gained international publicity and a platform for collaborative female contemporary art. In terms of presenting an artefact, this is tricky at the moment. From what I have investigated so far, a primary source of documentation was the photography of Dori Atlantis. I would propose exhibiting a range of documentary footage presenting information about the experiment in it’s first year, whether that be photographs, program notes, interviews with members etc. With regards to the accessibility of artefacts, the Conley Art Gallery at California State University, Fresno produced an exhibition of work produced during this first year in 2009, along with a symposium. I am currently in the process of contacting Dr Laura Meyer who assembled this program, as well as Nancy Youdelman, who was a participating student 1970-71, to hopefully gain some more information and the possibility of any documentation, artefacts, videos etc being accessible for us to use.

I feel the Fresno Feminist Art Experiment is a fantastic example of experimental arts education, pioneering formats of discourse which we now take for granted, and creating a safe and secure environment (aka studio), which many now lament the loss of. In a similar way to Pontus Hulten’s school, which Natasha has been investigating, there is the danger of this experiment being forgotten about as the history of other projects and exhibitions overshadow it’s original significance.

Holly

james-harper:

Joseph Kosuth, Information Room (Special Investigation), 1970

This installation, made up of two long tables, features paperbacks and newspapers from Kosuth’s own personal library. He is said to have described it as “an exhibition space containing knowledge, not objects”.