What is the work?

The work is live
The work is doing something
The work is active
The work is performative
The work is standing
The work is balancing
The work is absurd
The work is failing
The work is setting up a situation
The work is temporary
The work is a set of instructions
The work is participatory
The work is participation
The work is variable
The work is repeatable
The work is discourse
The work is anecdotal
The work is formal
The work is difficult
The work is critical
The work is criticising
The work is a question
The work is making decisions
The work is documented
The work is theoretical
The work is a period of time
The work is a task
The work is directed
The work is experienced
The work is relational
The work is political
The work is challenged
The work is unpredicted
The work is unrehearsed
The work is unknown at the outset
The work is knowing good from bad
The work is attempting to deviate from the norm
The work is obvious
The work is economically viable
The work is logical
The work is reproducible
The work is true
The work is learning
The work is ongoing
The work is something

Opinions...

I was listening to Robin Ince and Josie Long's Utter Shambles podcast on the way into school this morning, (episode 5: Al Murray), and Ince used a quote by Harlan Ellison which I just wanted to note down as it is a much more eloquently stated version of a point I've been arguing since the start of the first year...


"You are not entitled to your opinion, you are entitled to your informed opinion. No one is entitled to be ignorant." 

Failing to stand on an upturned brick... (images)

Triads...

I attended Neil's workshop today, it started with a talk about his Shift/Work project at ESW this summer, which was interesting but, given that I was involved to some extent already, not entirely new to me... Once Neil had talked about the project we then moved on to an exercise in triad tutorials, the subject of the third Shift/Work workshop, originally lead by Sarah Tripp, who I believe is going to follow up on todays workshop later in the semester. 


A triad tutorial consists of a speaker, (the person who is receiving the tutorial), a listener, (the person giving the tutorial), and a witness/observer. The speaker starts by speaking, naturally, about a given subject for a predetermined amount of time, In our case 10 minutes. During this time the listener listens and is free to make notes while the observer watches the two, making notes about the whole interaction. Once the 10 minutes are up it is then the listeners turn to speak, also for 10 minutes, also uninterrupted. The listener feeds back to the speaker who now listens, again while the observer does his/her best to be objective. Once the second 10 minutes is up the observer reads back his observations to both the speaker and the listener. This process is then repeated twice more, rotating the role of the participants each time.


The experience was both interesting and useful and I always welcome different approaches to crits... anything that might help... If nothing else it is reassuring to be part of a course that is looking to examine it's own modes of assessment and criticality... several people commented that it was difficult or unusual to talk uninterrupted for so long. Also that even though everybody talked for an equal amount of time, that it didn't feel as if anyone had conversed. These things are new and challenging and for those reasons, among others, I look forward to more.

Tutorial one...

Another good chat with Andrew Sneddon. The gist of the thing was that I just need to nail it... which once written down is incredibly vague again... Being able to say this is what I do/what i am doing with certainty rather than it all being up in the air. Being able say what the point of the work is/what I'm investigating. All of which is kind of there but just needs nailing down... so that's what I need to do, nail it. We agreed that trying to arrange a graphic design crit was a good idea and would open me up to criticism in a way that might help me nail it... By nailing it I find it easier to decide how best to approach making the work and how to best define my role/position within the work. Nailing it is about articulation and clarity. We talked about Daniel Buren and Peter Liversidge and the Simon Starling work currently at Ingleby, which I may write about anon... That's about all I can say for now...

Untitled (black & white dice) 2010. Peter Liversidge

Daniel Buren

When is the same different? and vis-versa...

One man failing to balance on an upended brick for any notable period of time.

The pub/Arno/graphic design...

After a bit of a let down day last week, (involving unwanted walls appearing in my studio and other real estate issues that I thought I'd avoided but always have a way of cropping up at the start of the year), I ended up in the Blazer chatting with Arno Verhoeven from the school of Design about my posters. Why don't I talk to graphic design students about the posters? Don't you love those questions so blindingly obvious that once asked you wonder why never thought of them. I now intend to contact Zoe Patterson, the head of the graphic design department, to discuss the posiblity of arranging some sort of inter-school crit with post grad design students in a way that will hopefully be of mutual benifit. I have also been toying with the idea that this could be some sort of workshop, that is, that if the crit was held in C02 it could be open for spectators who may also benifit from the wisdom of design students... I don't know it's all pie in the sky at the minute but it's an idea and one worth following up!

First Seminar... a quick note.

First seminar of the second year was straight forward I thought. A rough overview of, (at least one definition of), visual cultures with more detailed discussions to follow. Next Seminar we will each, (in small groups of 3 or 4), make 15 presentations on set texts. My text is Notes on Camp by Susan Sontag. There was no real discussion about what the presentation should be exactly but I guess we should be able to figure that out by now. I've had a read through the text and figure we should start by explaining what we gather Sontag is doing, (defining camp), and then have a stab at explaining how we think she's doing it, (in this case mainly giving lists of examples of things that are camp followed by things that you might think are camp but actually aren't). Finally we should point out any problems we have with the text and open this up for discussion with the rest of the group... (camp is purely aesthetic, apolitical and acritical, apparently). I have yet to arrange a meeting with the other three members of my reading group to find out what they think...

Two people stood on a chair for one hour.

Ask your family... (used)

Susie's description of what I do, installed on the back of the door in C02

Ask your family... (unused)

Neil's first project of the year: Ask your family to describe what you do and present it in C02 so everyone else can read it... I asked my Mum, Dad and Sister to do this as well as Susie. On further description of this task, Neil then pointed out that only one persons description was necessary and that the point in a way is that people would get an idea of what you do but not in your words... I appreciated the efforts of family greatly but if this is a task designed to present a description of your work to people who don't know it surely you choose the person who writes about art for a living, so I did. As I have said though, I do greatly appreciate the efforts of my family and so I thought I'd publish their writings here for all to see. It is always an interesting exercise listening to somebody else describe what they think you do and what they think is important...

Andrew is an individual of his art and is not afraid of pushing boundaries. He is always challenging himself to explore his imagination and let his mind take him on an adventure.

What I find especially interesting and exciting is there is no specific genre. He is willing and confident in his thoughts, ideas and ability to put these into practice either alone or by enlisting help, e.g. standing on posts, magic tricks. He does though thrive on interaction and is not fazed by criticism, usually finding an answer to it and taking a positive out of it. (Mum).

I think Andrew creates and develops art that challenges people’s perception of what art is. He explores the concept of visual and performance art and at the minute, for me, borders on creating theatrical performances. His work presents a skill, however simple (standing on an object for a period of time), for an audience to observe. His work is site-specific and always unique – the performance work has the potential to succeed or fail and therefore has a risk factor. His work is not replicable for this reason – if the work was recreated it would always be different, as the elements of the performance can never be exactly the same.  

I think his work is imaginative, visually interesting and expresses an alternative way of thinking about how everyday objects, settings and actions can be placed together to create art. (Sister).

Ever since Andrew branched out to the modern side of art I've never understood what he is creating as his artwork, but I know that it is his work. He has always put his thoughts & beliefs into his practice. (Dad).

Chair work?

Yesterday's first attempt at many people stood on a chair...

On this particular chair, three people seemed easy enough, four was more of a challenge. It's obvious that a more solid chair would be useful. 
I don't know which is more interesting, to many people failing to stand on the chair or fewer people sharing the small space for a longer duration. Only one way to find out...

Air France - Benjamin Millepied & Virginie Caussin

Springs

As I was leaving the studio today I happened to notice that my table is on springs... This looks remarkably like the kind of mischief that either of my friends, Martha or Peter, might have gotten up to last year on their intermedia undergrad. Of all the desks in all the studios it wound up being in mine... a rather nice serendipity I thought. 

New year, new studio

Day one back in the studio... I don't have neighbours yet, that'll happen tomorrow. Glad to be back. As you can see from the image I've thrown some posters up from last semester just to break up the empty and hopefully to give the new first year an idea of what I've been doing...
Hopefully these blogs will get more interesting again soon but in the mean time this is a quote that I started the course with this time last year. I thought I'd post it again just in case it's still useful...

Among the maxims on Lord Naoshige’s wall there was this one: “Matters of great concern should be treated lightly.” Master Ittei commented, “Matters of small concern should be treated seriously.”

(Hagakure, 1709 – 1716.)

A quick note on the merger so far...

A slight thematic aside for this blog maybe but I can't help making a few notes on the recent "merger" of ECA with UoE... I don't intend to spend huge amounts of my time seething about it but noting down initial feelings may be useful at some point, who knows...


It's first of all worth considering the term "merger." This is not a merger, it is and has always been a take over. That is how it feels at least.


Returning to ECA this semester to find cheaply made UoE banners hung in ever conceivable location was a little disheartening. I had hoped that the university may have had the grace to allow ECA to hold on to at least a sense of Independence. Given that at every meeting, interview, polling session and focus group I attended, (& I attended quite a few,) this was considered a key issue. UoE is a completely different type of institution with different attitudes towards teaching and to its students, and so it should be, but when a small institution is suddenly consumed by a much larger one the smaller institution could be forgiven for being nervous about how its practices and nuances are going to be maintained or supported, if at all.


Even the muffins are branded UoE. There is no doubt in anybodies mind that they are now part of the university. Whether this brings with it more benefits than problems is still yet to be seen but in terms of making the students (& staff) feel uneasy I think we're off to a good start.


Here's hoping things get better.

Public school Workshop 3

An auto-appropriated text:
Festivals, Events & Street Performance.
A performance of exciting taiko rhythms, dynamic choreography & high energy, brought to you from the Mygen Taiko Dojo. The UK's centre for Taiko drumming, based in central Scotland.
Taiko drumming is a centuries old folk art, a festival music originally from Japan.
At the Dojo, we train & develop the future star players of Taiko, as well as open workshops for the public.
We also have a professional touring group based at the Mugen Taiko Dojo. 
See overleaf.

Todays thoughts...

I'm looking forward to the Bill Bollinger show coming to the Fruitmarket this Autumn...

There's something familiar about the attempts to stand a telegraph pole on end...


I've also been thinking about Warhol's screen tests... failure to pose...