http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Miss B's Salons Fri, 08 Aug 2008 19:35:04 +0100 a-n rss generator a-n The Artists Information Company and contributors edit@a-n.co.uk technical@a-n.co.uk http://sites.a-n.co.uk/img/logo.gif http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 "Cher Monsieurs et Madames - mes amis et collègues of great refinement, I very much look forward welcoming you to the forthcoming Salons. Your presence is sought, if possible, at each and every Salon (we would miss you terribly otherwise), and you will be asked to make a presentation or recital during one of evenings – the specific dates for which I will endeavour to communicate shortly. I am currently organising venues and events for each Salon. If you are keen to host, please contact me post-haste. I may contact you directly about such services. I am open to suggestions for meeting formats, activities, and special guests. All Salons will take place on Tuesdays, 7-9pm. Victuals and libations will be provided where possible.Salutations distinguéesMiss B"The above 'save the date' went out on 5 January, following individual meetings and emails with the guests/participants. They should also this week have received a hand-made invitation (see pic); typed on my new ‘Tippa S’ typewriter (bought on Ebay from a lady in Kent whose clearout had apparently also uncovered a piece of paper with the signatures of Queen Victoria, Lord Palmerston and a German count. Intriguing.) I have discovered that typing requires a lot of patience (and paper). The invitations are also embellished with little watercolour motifs. This blog will be used to document the Salons. I will post images and notes from each one. I am hosting the Salons,  but despite my planning, the direction will essentially be determined by the members of the group, who will all have something to bring from their own fabulous projects. The group may change, but currently stand as: Melanie Carvalho, Spartacus Chetwynd, Sarah Doyle, Tommy Grace, Kate Hawkins, Cathy Lomax, Rebecca May Marston, Karen Mirza, Ben Roberts, Andrew Tullis and Anne-Marie Watson. There will also be guest artists and curators. The first Salon is on Tuesday. Spartacus Chetwynd is going to show 'The Walk to Dover'; a film that documents a seven-day expedition by a group of walkers in urchin costume, emulating David Copperfield’s walk from London to Dover. In anticipation, am listening to Nils Norman reading Michel de Certeau on www.audio-theory.com - Ms Chetwynd’s brilliant site with extracts of cultural theory read by artists and theorists. On Tuesday, I will also be giving a slide presentation about follies, ruins and my work. We will have apples and tinned sardines and ale (and maybe pancakes too to be topical). ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no. 1:Venue: 9th floor modernism on the post-war inner-city housing success story Golden Lane Estate. Attendees: Bev Bytheway, Clare Cumberlidge, Kate Hawkins, Andrew Tullis, Ben Roberts, Anne-Marie Watson, Cathy Lomax, Rebecca May Marston, Spartacus Chetwynd and Ruth Beale. Three apologies and one absence due to hospitalisation(!)  Speakers: Ms Beale, Ms Chetwynd.Befitting victuals: bread, apples, cheese, sardines on toast, Elderflower cordial, rosehip tea, ale. On the record player: Reginald Liversidge and Peter Jebson Entertain at the Manchester Gaumont Lancashire WURLITZER (sic) and Amazing Bavarian Stompers (Pontefract charity shop purchases)Spartacus showed The Walk to Dover –  see previous post - and I fired through about 100 slides; a mixture of my work, buildings I’ve visited, Aurora projects and random found slides. I am glad that my presentation is out the way, because I will make a better hostess when i'm not doing silly things like leaving my projector cable in Hackney and having to run back for it just before the Salon.Some starting statements and questions posed to the group:•  Art and life: the productive and consumptive activity inherent in everyday life.•  Jack of all trades, master of none .•  “Artists shouldn’t show in projects they have curated themselves”. The integrity issue. •  Self-organisation - responsive, subversive, spontaneous.•  Lo-fi. Low budget. Home-made. Purely Aesthetic concerns?•  Institutions that emanate the artist-run project.•  Integrated practice? Where does artists practice start and finish? • Strategic moves and self-mythologising. Just a stepping-stone on the career path?We talked about the notion of doing something for itself (like going on holiday) or making it art by framing it and presenting it as such. There was agreement about the importance of just doing stuff.. not waiting for reasons, but that sometimes outside catalysts that provide a framework can help. Most heated subject: does the appeal of doing things for the sake of doing them, rather than as a career move or for monentary gain come when one is afforded the ‘luxury’ of an alternative? Further reading/visits: The German Hospital in Hackney; The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tresham; George Orwell’s essay on Charles Dickens; Le Mystère du château du dé by Man Ray, the officially off-limits roof of Great Arthur House on the Golden Lane estate, and more including other films I have forgotton (note to self: take notes to self).... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 I had a very disturbing dream on Friday that the next Salon was dominated by a an (impostor) artist who behaved disgracefully and dominated the whole thing with an unrepeatably unsavoury performance. Every hostess' nightmare. I assure you Guests - this will not happen.  ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.2:Location: studio/warehouse apt in DalstonAttendees: Anne-Marie Watson, Kate Hawkins, Alice Shay, Karen Mirza, Spartacus Chetwynd, Andrew Tullis, Ruth Beale.Speakers: Ms Hawkins, Mr Tullis.Supper: dips, salsa, soup, breads, carrot cake and wine (a red theme..!)We watched two films of Joseph Beuys' trips to Scotland; roadtrips and Richard De Marco looking very pleased with himself.Andrew showed us his documentary film The Man Who Captured Nessie about Loch Ness Monster Hunter Frank Searle’s strange life, obsession, fakery and dubious relationship with the truth. We talked about escaping entirely and assuming identities (see Dr Charlotte Bach below). Kate showed the film of her performance Eternal Peas – the professed link was 'lies', this time etiquette’s pretence at propriety come endurance test. We talked of anecdotes and eventually Annabel Chong’s sex marathon (who was screwing who – the TV producers came out best). There was also introduced the subject of ‘newness’, illustrated through a fluxus diagram showing creativity, Fluxus, art and unexeplored territory (they don't care about being new). We talked about: the word galvanise coming from Galvani, who discovered that electric shocks could induce twitches in frogs legs.. leading to the idea of a human undead factory labourforce; re-enactments; Smithson’s widow signing editions after his death; repetition of the same stories in creative folk traditions such as Mumming plays (crusader type falls ill, doctor cures, all well). We also continued the conversation about doing stuff: Why do we still make work for galleries when other media such as TV and magazines offer alternative means of exhibition and communication?; how does having a day job become both a financial necessity and artistic hindrance – what about Chekov who was Doctor, and Chaucer who was a civil servant?Further reading/viewing: Who was Dr Charlotte Bach?, Nessies, Seven Years in Search of the Monster, The Princess and the Pea, Black Christmas, Russian Arc, I am Curious (Blue), Picnic at the Hanging Rock, BBC Iplayer, TVI. ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Some works talked about so far.... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 I have asked the group to read the article at the following link in advance of the next meeting, with a view to taking the notion of starting culture 'from scratch' as explored in 'The so-called utopia of the centre beauborg' (Luca Frei's interpretation).  http://www.metamute.org/en/In-the-Bowels-of-the-Fun-Palace... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.3Location: loft apartment on Bethnal Green Road.Present: James Porter, Alice Shay, Ben Roberts, Andrew Tullis, Russell Martin, Lisa Le Feuvre, Karen Mirza, Melanie Carvalho, Anne-Marie Watson and Ruth Beale. Themed buffet (East End Delights): bagels and samosas from Brick Lane, cakes and tarts made by Mrs Pelicci from E.Pelicci's cafe.Speaker: Ms Mirza Miss B's reading: extract from The so-called utopia of the centre beaubourg - An interpretation by Luca Frei (www.bookworks.org.uk) and from the essay in in the last post. The essay draws comparisons between the Centre Beaubourg -  an imagined radical libertarian space submerged over 76 stories beneath the newly erected Pompidou centre in which the population are invited to reinvent 'culture' - and the architect Cedric Price's unrealised Fun Palace - an interactive 'laboratory of fun' with interchangeable architecture.. and a precursor to and inspiration for the Pompidou.  I had imagined that the conversation would focus around the notion of the 'blank slate' - the beginnings of any artistic, organisational or curatorial project; if or how this could ever be blank. It steered, however, more to the problems and constraints within this 'egalitarian' architecture. It was felt that architecture could not be truly democratic; besides the ego of the architect, there is the question of predetermined elements influencing behaviour. Also, some found the anti-intellectualisation or anti-skilling of culture problematic. Contemporary precedents cropped up - Public Works, N55 -but our interest was drawn to real self-generated culture, the stuff that crops up in the cracks. I wonder now about this kind of state-sponsored culture ever being viable.  This led to ideas about subversion (Foucault's theory that a government should turn allow a certain amount of subversion or law-breaking but keep one eye on it), from the beer tent at Crystal Palace that really drew the workers, the cinema in Paris' underground network, soundsystems in Spanish sewers, restrictions on meeting and protesting.. was Rave a political act?More about the discussion around Karen Mirza's work to follow..  ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.3 (cont)After a week's reprieve, the Salons resume tonight. Plans for a 'reading week' were on hold as I spent two weeks tracking down a set of Lefebvre's Critique of Everyday Life. Finally in my clutches, I have prepared a reading tonight on artistic expression.Going back to the last Salon, I did not report last week on the discussion around Karen Mirza's work -  a series of films made with her collaborator Brad Butler. Two stacked TV monitors showed a person (different each time) standing holding a mirror (in one case) and a piece of coloured perspex (in another) in different locations. Both the reflection and the scene behind the protagonist could be seen. Sometimes the camera came into sight. The dimensions of the mirror corresponded to that of a TV screen but created another frame. Locations included Coney Island beach and a Karachi street. References thrown up by the group included the film Mean Streets, Morris (used mirror), colour field paintings.Discovering that these works were meant as films and not video changed our perception - the work then became about light, reflection, film: determining space through film. Someone asked if Karen had thought of making the work a performance (possible live event). We talked about how speculating the audience for a work affected it's creation, and how the same work would be viewed by people in different cultures. Karen professed an obsession with 'space' and the ephemeral, and an interest in the frame and the gaze. It was interesting to hear that Brad's slant relates to his background as an athropologist - in the people, their behaviour. In the context of the earlier discussions, we talked about   relationship betweem passive and controlled experience, and the notion of setting 'rules ' in everything we do. It seems we are always working withing existing frameworks, but by starting things and making work we have the chance to make our own systems and rules. ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.4Location: Limoncello gallery, Hoxton Street. Present: Alice Shay, Brad Butler, Melanie Carvalho, Karen Mirza, Rebecca May Marston, Lucy Clout, Andrew Tullis, Anne-Marie Watson, Ben Roberts and Ruth Beale. Delectable treats: Italian canapes, home-made Limoncello and After Eight mints.  Speakers: Ms May Marston (assisted by Ms Clout) and Ms Watson. Until I find my notes, I'm just going to write out the reading which preceded the presentations. It's from Henri Lefebre's Critique of Everyday Life, Volume 1 (a pre-cursor to de Certeau's Practice of Everyday Life discussed in an earlier Salon), from the chapter 'The Development of Marxist Thought': "Every ideology us an 'expression' of its time; but in fact the term has no predetermined meaning; in hindsight a critically minded reader will realise that a novel, a play or a book of poetry was an ‘expression’ of its times – one possible ‘expression’ among others. There can be all manner of spaces and distances, transpositions and metamorphoses, standing between reality and the ways reality is expressed, so much so the very differing works of art can equally and quite justifiably be regarded as ‘expressing’ the same moment in time (Balzac and Stendhal, for example). Here again the distance between what is expressed and the means of expression itself must be bridged by a doube-edged line of though: on the one hand, by explaining each work in the light of real life; and on the other by seeking to discover what we learn about that life as it was, in the literary work which has ‘expressed’ it” Does culture make us, or do we make culture?     ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.4 (cont)More on the discussion at Limoncello:Lucy Clout presented the Associates programme on behalf of Rebecca. This unique venture of Ryan Gander's - to put £40k into a year-long programme promoting 12 artists - shows an extroadinary generosity.. and overt (positively joyful) nepotism. But also a deliberately manipulative approach to the market, to try and launch these artists' careers and get them representation. We branded him a philanthropist (is that a good thing or a bad thing?). Limoncello seems to have grown organically from Associates, staying in the same space and working with some of the ‘associate artists’. It was really nice to see a curatorial sensibility in the selection of artists, and such a simple thing, to bring together these artists whose work you think is great and undervalued (and who have since become friends). There's something special about the sincerity and honesty of this position that belies the hard graft required to and make the gallery viable.  Criticisms of the commercial art world have come up several times in the Salons, in relation to the drive, ambition or focus of artists. Sometimes we have talked about artists motivation for making work but this time about the vulnerability of the trust relationship - the suspicion of contracts -  but how this can create power struggles rather than loyalties.  Anne-Marie described her Seam project in Glasgow as deliberately non-commercial. This was perhaps reflects the lack of a contemporary commercial market in Galsgow, but also the promotional/career progression position that peers and artist-run projects profer almost in place of this. This could be seen in some of the artists she showed - the projects gave the chance to make and show work but not just muck around (in Anne-Marie's own words - some the work seems surprisingly formal in retrospect).  It was great to see slides of the space which she chose to leave gutted on the inside, but to paint the facade white and pristine on the outside.. playing with artist-gallery-as-regeneration/gentrification.  ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.5Location: Upstairs at the Wenlock Arms. A Proper pub. Present: Karen Mirza, Alice Shay, Andrew Tullis, Ben Roberts, Melanie Carvalho, Anne-Marie Watson, Spartacus Chetwynd and Ruth Beale.Pub buffet: egg mayo, cheese and pickle, ham and mustard,  pork pies, sausage rolls, scotch eggs, crisps and dip. Real Ale. Speakers: Mr Roberts and Ms Shay.Ben Roberts led us through some of the experimental live art and multi-artform events projects he has programmed at Camden Arts Centre – it’s clear his job title as Programme Co-ordinator within the Education department doesn’t fully represent the role he has carved out for himself.. the development of programming as practice (Camden’s no curator stance.. ‘no curators’ or ‘everyone’s a curator’?). It was great to see how Camden operates on a number of levels – as an international art space; community education programmes; emerging artists’ residencies; (occasionally dangerous) performance art. Ben told us about Robin Deacon’s performance / re-enactment of Moby Dick where Robin ended up in a bath of water with a microphone in his hands. Where do you step in and stop it?We returned to the idea of the spontaneous within the institution – such as the 24-hour performance marathon at The Serpentine Pavilion… when the shambolicness and over-ambitiousness is practically deliberately incorporated to create energy (perhaps as an audience we want a bit of an ‘edge’... we want it to be ‘experimental’, dancing on the brink between brilliance and chaos..).Ben’s new project – Brown Mountain Festival – is a spin-off from Sally O’Reilly and Mel Brimfield’s Brown Mountain College (a sly to Black Mountain College - www.bmcproject.org). They plan to put on events during Frieze (yes, another thing we mused, but worth it for all the internationals in town during that week). He cited ‘white nights’ as an inspiration - in Rome Paris and Brussels cinemas; theatres, museums, art galleries, shops, restaurants and clubs stay open all night. When can we do this in London?!... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.5 (cont)So to Ms Shay's turn at the Wenlock.. Alice set up a task for us. She handed out cards with words on, and we were to choose three that appealed to us. Inside were images of an installation made from objects found on a walk. We were to draw our own cartographies relating to the words. Alice played us a 10-minute spoken word sound piece where she described a walk. As the words on our cards cropped up we had to place them in the centre of the table – like a game of consequences, or exquisite corpse. The reading was rich took us through a semi-familiar city-scape (not without its wildernesses and disorder). The drawings made us listen and hang on every word. Alice has studied both urban theory and art theory, and her artistic projects have been influenced by this. The project was a many-layered detourn – the drawing, installation and sound piece as process-based and interpretive.. and steps away from the ‘experience’.Further reading from Salon 5: George Orwell - Keep the Aspidistra Flying (but not the film); Dostoyevsky - Crime and Punishment; Rainer Werner Fassbinder films; Knut Hanson – Hunger. (I have also written down Bruce  Chapman, Sunlines, but can only find reference on the internet to a US politician with links to the religious right and a conservative think-tank. Perhaps not)... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.6Attendees: Cathy Lomax, Karen Mirza, Andrew Tullis, Melanie Carvalho, Ruth BealeLocation: Transition Gallery – a second-floor unit in the GLC-era Regent Studios business block. Libations: oatcakes and cheese, smoked salmon pate, celery, shortbread, pink fizzy wine with strawberries. We started by talking about The Crying of Potential Estate, a project that Karen had picked up on: a fiendishly multi-layered artists’ group project that involved a story written being cut up into 45 lots that were actioned and read from an audio-booth as they were sold. The story related to Belgium Wisconsin, but the group are Belgian and the auction was in New York.. They seemed to be creating an alternative economy, whilst reinventing and utilising every layer of the means of dissemination. This was all whilst nibbling on the faux-Scottish spread - in celebration of Mel’s ‘Tropical Scotland’ project, but totally apt too to Cathy’s musings on real ‘Englishness’. Cathy read us a text about ‘Albion’: Britishness, or more specifically Englishness, and showed us images of some of her paintings and ‘The English Museum’ installation she made with Alex Micho.n She said she was embarrassed about the text’s ‘crudeness’, but it had a fresh honesty in its celebration of English talent and verve, as well as England’s seaside shabby mediocrity. Cathy showed us ‘O Dreamland’ by Lindsay Anderson – a film essay made from documentary footage of the Dreamland pleasure beach in Margate. The film is in some part celebration of that grim post-war determination to have fun.. and the gritty side of England that sees folk traditions caught between the industrial age and modernity (but no glitz). An appealing simplicity. Is this what we can’t find anywhere else? What keeps us from from skipping the country? There was certainly an element of voyeurism.. a horror in the deprivation. But the ‘Free Cinema’ movement, we learned, was about cheap filmmaking made outside the confines of the film industry, showing ordinary, working-class British people. Their manifesto:These films were not made together; nor with theidea of showing them together. But when they cametogether, we felt they had an attitude in common.Implicit in this attitude is a belief in freedom,in the importance of people and the significance ofthe everyday.As filmmakers we believe that    No film can be too personal.The image speaks. Sound amplifies and comments.Size is irrelevant. Perfection is not an aim.An attitude means a style. A style means an attitude.True DIY ethic! And that era of filmmaking seemed to be made possible by good people getting inside of institutions with vision and the conviction to carry out their own agenda (again, subversion from the inside). Beuys’ schooling (where he accepted anyone who wanted to come to his classes) cropped up again. What a remarkable thing.. easy in theory but so difficult to carry through when your class is heaving with hundreds of students. ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.6 (cont)For Melanie too, the issue of national identity was forefront. Her poetic mission, to seek out palm trees around Scotland, took her around the country on travels over two years. It was in part in response to her discomfort at anti-English sentiment - but more particularly the idea that she wouldn't be offended by it as she was told by one person she "wasn't really English". The project was took in the notion of the botanical explorers. She drew and painted, but the diaries and accounts became as much the artwork as the beautiful paintings. Mel read an extract of the diary to us; personal journeys and incidental events. We talked of colonisation, of how Scotland is seen to lend itself to being ‘toured’ (or is victim to the European and North American impulse to colonise), and heard about Mel’s lectures with experts: horticulturalists and those that have broken down the notion of the ‘native’. She showed us a film too, in a tropical garden in Scotland’s gulf stream west coast; her outdoor gear giving her the authority to roam about in the undergrowth; her on-the-spot botanical painting quaint and still strangely eccentric.Further reading: Coast magazine; Radio 4’s 1968 season; Ken Russell films; A Rum Affair: A True Story of Botanical Fraud (about the respected horticulturalist who pretended to find new species on Rum). Thoughts about the future of the Salons to come..... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Comments and prizes..I have been informed by two seprate astute gentlemen that the film I may have been attempting to note down was Songlines by Bruce Chatwin. As I had imagined - nothing to do with right-wing politics.Mr Andrew Tullis wins the prize for coming to ALL the Salons so far. A themed buffet of his choosing? ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.6 (cont)We reflected on the six Salons and the people that have come together. Despite differences in practices and ways on working, there was a thread that emerged running through the ‘guests’ work and projects. Karen described it as ‘structures that are flexible but have focus and rigour’. Fundamental to these projects is the objective to subvert, manipulate, challenge question and highlight existing structures for the production and dissemination of art… not just to replicate. To create something responsive. Projects that construct meaningful conceptual frameworks for making and sharing art and ideas.Can these structures survive when they wish to operate outside traditional funding structures? Ben’s limited edition ‘shares’ sold to finance Brown Mountain Festival (part artwork, part intangible share in live art) or The Crying of Potential Estate obviously get actual money out of people who actually  have some to start with.. creative entrepreneurialism.. I've just spotted Emilia Telese's new blog on the artist as social entrepreneur.. We all relate to shoehorning ourselves into various boxes in order to get funding, or at least presenting our projects to others in a way that will appeal to funders. Community.. social agendas.. creative industries.. commercial product. Whichever way the policy is leaning. Superficial Measurements of qualitiatve and quantative meaning – is that our prerogative? Whilst wrestling off the cliche of artists as sociopathic incapables we have subjected ourselves to worries about the deadly audit? Gotta stop those artists buggering off on holiday with their arts council grants (like the hoax-holiday students from Leeds who pretended to do that but spent two weeks in a Headingly basement taking turns on the sunbed).Perhaps initiating our own projects is a way of allowing, even expecting, for projects to change direction and become something else through the act of carrying them out.... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 I have emailed the group with an invitation to collaborate. The first series of six Salons now feels like a pilot project: they will certainly continue. I’m thinking roughly once a month. I’m hoping to partner up with people for each upcoming one – so that those who would like to be more involved, can. Others can just turn up. We can also open them up more to other people – there are loads of people I think would like to come to different ones depending on what the subject is. I really enjoyed a reading event that Spartacus did at Vilma Gold about a month ago.. It was a totally open thing, but by dressing up in a kind of inside out outfit, it injected an air of silliness that putting others at ease but also contextualised the discussion about the carnivalesque. She had everyone wearing pants on their head and reading Rabellais, but in a way that felt like it was totally cool to join in or not. A fine skill. Eleven people made presentations at the first six Salons, which I think was a lot. But we learnt a lot, about what each other did/do, and what the Salons could be. I’m looking forward to the flexibility that can be afforded them now. They can be anything. It would be nice if some of the same people came, but also if some of the people who asked to come came, and some of the people who couldn’t make it to the first ones. Lined up for May and June: a 'favourite bits' video night hosted by Andrew Tullis; and a beer-making workshop where we will consider the artisan in the everyday and maybe read some Morris. A few other ideas: bring a short film club; show-and-tell research material or a piece of work that has influenced you; continue the critique of the everyday; style; rules; archives; anthropology; secret Fascist architecture fetishes.... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.7 Andrew Tullis has chosen three films for the upcoming Salon. He has been ruminating on the 'bucolic':The Moon And The Sledgehammer 1971 Dir.: Philip TrevelyanThe Page Family live in a ramshackle house situated in six acres of woodland, which they own themselves, in the heart of the commuter-belt, 20 miles south of London. The trees cut the Pages off completely from the outside world, and isolated in their island-clearing, they let the 20th Century slowly pass them by.The Summer Walkers 1976 Dir.: Timothy Neat & Hamish HendersonThe Summer Walkers is the name the crofters of Scotland's North West Highlands gave the Travelling People. These Scottish nomads are not gypsies. They are indigenous Gaelic-speaking Highlanders and they remain heirs to a vital and ancient culture. This film documents a vanishing way of life.The Legend of Boggy Creek 1972 Dir.: Charles B. PierceThe southwest corner of Arkansas is the scene of terrible animal killings, frightening human experience, strange sightings and strange noises. As the actual interviews with area residents progress horror and suspense mount. Could this be real or a conspiracy of a backwoods community hungering for recognition? A drama-documentary style thriller about a hulking, hairy creature that inhabits a swamp in Fouke, Arkansas.Also, if we're lucky we might pack in some Wier's Way.  ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.7 (cont)Mr Tullis’ films were a real treat. All documentaries of sorts (including the horror ‘mock-doc’ Bog Man) we came to question the position of the filmmaker within the narrative. Victual delights of ploughmans’ suppers (with chutney made by Miss B’s mother) cider, homemade plum cake, and ginger beer floats, were followed by sharing some definitions of historical terms that go back to the very root of  the ancient obsession with the bucolic.Bucolic itself – a pastoral poem, representing rural affairs, and the life, manners, and occupation of shepherds; as in the Bucolics of Theocritus and Virgil.Pastoral – the lifestyle of shepherds and pastoralists. Also literature, art and music which depicts a romanticised life of shepherds, often in a highly idealised and unrealistic manner. Rustic chores are held in the fantasy to be almost wholly undemanding and left in the background, leaving shepherdesses in a state of almost perfect leisure. This makes them available for embodying perpetual erotic fantasies.Idyll – a scene or event characterized by tranquility, serene and carefree happiness, simple beauty, and innocent charm, usually in a beautiful rural setting.Arcadia – a Utopian vision of pastoralism and harmony with nature; unspoiled wilderness. The term is derived from the Greek province of the same name, which dates to antiquity.Unlike 'utopia', 'Arcadia' does not carry the connotation of a human civilization.Golden Age -  a time in the beginnings of Humanity which was perceived as an ideal state.In literary works, the Golden Age usually ends with a devastating event, which brings about the Fall of ManRustic – Of, relating to, or typical of country life or country people; Lacking refinement or elegance; coarse; Charmingly simple or unsophisticated; A rural person.Are there depictions of rural life that haven't been filtered through, (or for) an equivalent of the urban perspective? Is the rural just a backdrop for a commentary on urban concerns?... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.7 (cont)The Moon and the Sledgehammer featured an adult family living in a house in rural England in a kind of antiquated way. There are amusing and contrived bits (eccentric elderly man wearing a gas mask and pretending to be an elephan), but also a disturcing undercurrent of a abuse, generated in part by the unusual characters.. We discussed their relationship with the camera – they seemed very aware of it, and played up to it, but not quite in the way that cameras are seen as some sort of career move now, a meal ticket that but be manipulated to the ends of the subject. The idea of them being cut off seemed to be imposed by filmmaker. Andrew had made a pilgrimage to the house and discovered it was quite near a road, not far from a village. We drew parallels with Luke Fowler’s Bog Man. Fowler found himself drawn into what he thought at first to be a barren landscape, and our relationship or observation of the ‘bog man’ is of sympathy, doubt, and voyeurism. What beauty can we see? From land that Spartacus visited in Kent – going cheap because of pylons and it’s own hermit – to tended parks and industrial wilds of East London - can we escape our own kitsch versions of nature and the rural? The Summer Walkers again came with an imposed narrative. Purportedly the last Scottish native travelling people, there is a deep nostalgia for the ‘tradition’ and tough way of life (the woman in the film looks bubonic, never mind bucolic). There is the mix of respect and pity.. something of the noble savage. There is also a dose of dubious origin myths-  like the Blues.. an invented ‘genre’ created to encapsulate and pigeonhole.The Legend of Boggy Creek presented a fine line between personal hell and idyll. As with all the films, there seems an intent to upset the idyll.. Despite the ‘tough’ life (none negate the strong work country ethic, so not quite the pastoral utopia of arcadia) it is seen as an simple earthly life, but one that is threatened, whether by medernity or giant hairy monsters trying to snatch the baby. It is as if we ‘all know it can’t exist’. Who are the fraudsters? The Filmmakers?Finally we looked for a minute of contemporary art’s relationship to the rural (see Karen magazine for a dose of the everyday mundane made everything), we liked Grizedale’s piss-take of trumped up rural arts organisations claiming to be the first, best most innovative.. bla bla. (see their newsletter for the full rant). Mythologising and self-mythologising. Reading list: Even Dwarves Started Small, Werner Herzog; Grey Gardens; Albert and David Maysles; Susan Froemke; Ellen Hovde, and Muffie Meyer; Wieland by Charles Brockden Brown.... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.8Present: Mr Statham, Ms May Marston, Ms Nunes Fernandes, Ms Chetwynd, Mr Tullis, Mr Harrison, Ms Duggal, MissBThe theme of 'The Artisan and the Everyday' for Salon no.8 was a moderately shallow attempt to find an excuse to both have Matthew Harrison round to talk about his work, and also get the chance to learn how to make beer, all on one sunny afternoon.  "Artisans were the dominant producers of goods before the Industrial Revolution. According to Classical economics theory, the division of labor occurs with internal market development. Artisans employ creative thinking and manual dexterity to produce their goods." I was thinking Arts and Crafts, John Ruskin, William Morris.. of 'absolute architecture', everything being considered and crafted, everything becoming art.. in a contemporary sense with Matthew's highly conceptual remaking of everyday items.  ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.8 (cont)Matthew's Save the Trees bangles have a wicked twist. The first set were engraved wood, which were desirable enough, then he brought out another 'luxury' brand set made from rare woods and protected trees species.. musing on how can art claim to have a moral stance and still be affiliated with luxury brands. Not done with that, he saved the sawdust from making these bangles to create his own MDF (yes, his own MDF) for the bespoke round post-box in his Limoncello show.. - www.limoncellogallery.co.ukIn a really simple way what is so admirable about his work is that it combines craftsmens skill, design (in an engineering, seeking to understand and have control over the object kind of way) with neat, concentric ideas (the tube with the limited edtion print of the postbox design, that gets posted in a tube to arrive through the postbox, but is sealed with bespoke tape in the same design as the drawing.. do you cut the tape and see the print, or keep the tape in tact and never see the print? Or is opening the tube not the point?). He talked about how the inspiring thing about art is that it can be the reason and purpose for making things that otherwise would not be made.. to do unnecessarily difficult or complex things for the sake of both the idea and the object.  ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.8 (cont) Christian (Mr.B)'s  generous and sincere tutorial in beer-making (see pictures) tought us about the mash, the importance of sterile tools, and patience. Blue Peter-style we bottled one he had made earlier, and also sampled an even earlier brew. We ignored the derision an attendee had received earlier about beer-making being 'very 70's' and embraced it as local, rural (think bucolic), simple and.. good for us (further reading: Traditional Beer & Cider Making by Ian Ball: "The toast 'to your good health' is a statement of fact when you drink traditional brews!""It is up to us now to make out own superb quality ale, beer and stout at home and continue the tradition of brewing excellence established by our forefathers.." The 'slow food' movement is clearly a return to artisan cooking and farming, after industrialisation - "craft labour destroyed by industrialists" - with peak oil kicking off we'll all be Digging (and brewing) for Britain.  ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627 Salon no.9Clarion Epic round-table discussionThe Institute for the Art and Practice of Dissent at Home, Liverpool (www.twoaddthree.org) Not strictly billed as a Miss B's Salon, but taking its place in the Salon monthly calendar, the roundtable discussion followed a bike ride from London to Liverpool made with Karen Breneman for our collaborative project the Clarion Epic. http://clarionepic.blogspot.com/   ... Thu, 01 Jan 1970 01:00:00 +0100 http://sites.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/408627