Use Value

In recent years we have have developed a number of projects with museum collections, retail stores, art galleries and places of education; all of which play a central role in structuring the exchange ofvalues, between people and things. Rather than conceiving an artwork that is taken to a designated space of display - conventionally an art gallery -we are interested in developing a range of practices relevant to the context of a particular project.

Use Value is a sound installation created specifically for the top-floor ceramics galleries at the Victoria & Albert Museum.

We are aware of how the conventions of the museum -its habits of classification, display and exhibition- turn all artifacts, whatever their provenance, into potential works of art: objects to be looked at. Removed from the everyday flow of things, or diverted from their rich and varied lives -where they are used, broken, abandoned, found repaired and re-used, inherited, lost or given and received as presents - the museum object is doomed to live forever in the conservation perfection of the vitrine.

Use Value returns an astonishing collection, to the social world of things.

Filtered through the ceramics galleries are audio recordings of various locations. As you browse the tableware the sophisticated chatter of the restaurant accompanies your stroll, only to be interupted by the clamour of school children scoffing their lunch. Remember the tenderness expressed in washing-up, or the lonliness of eating alone, and beware the horror of the accident as crockery shatters on the kitchen floor.

Our invitation to the museum visitor, is to vividly re-imagine the places and practices where these things belong.

Visit our hosts the Serpentine Gallery and the Victoria & Albert Museum