performance

Reprise

admin — Tue, 05 Dec 2006 13:34:59 +0000

This is the full text of the lecture, without annotations

REPRISE

A project by Neil Cummings and Marysia Lewandowska
on the occasion of Independence an exhibition at the South London Gallery
1st June â€“ 3rd August 2003

Souvenir Pamphlet

Price 20p
A SUMMARY OF THE HISTORY OF THE SOUTH LONDON ART GALLERY, LIBRARY AND LECTURE HALL
-From its Foundation in 1868-

Addressed to the council of the South London Fine Art Gallery January 4th 1893

The Institution now being a quarter of a century old, and Mr Westlake and myself being the only members familiar with this history as a whole, it seemed worthwhile to recount a summary of its history, especially as many people still think it is supported by ratepayers through the County Council.

Rene Gimpel

admin — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 14:14:55 +0000

Sub-Title

commissioned by Graham Hudson

End Date

Start Date

24 Jan 2003

Location

Royal College of Art: London

Body

Rene Gimpel
GIMPEL FILS
30 Davies Street
LONDON W1Y 1LG

Tel: 020 7493 2488

Dear Rene Gimpel,

Please find enclosed the text of a lecture which I think belongs to you, I found it on a lectern at Chelsea College of Art and Design; as you will see it has been annotated by me.

I should like to explain that I gave the lecture on your behalf, in fact as you, to the students at the Royal College of Art on the 24th January. I was invited to speak about my work as an artist, but during my preparation I read your lecture and began to think how appropriate it would be, not to talk about my practice but to perform it in some way. So, I announced to the students at the lecture, that Neil Cummings was unable to attend because of a personal crisis, and that I, Rene Gimpel had agreed to stand in at the last moment.

I then read your lecture verbatim, as best I could, using my own slides as accompaniment.

There was a very lively question and answer session afterwards, during which I at no time disclosed my ‘true’ identity. Students who already knew me interpreted the lecture as a critical gesture. Several students who did not know me tried to secure appointments to show me their work, or visit the gallery. I declined as tactfully as I could, and made no promises on your behalf.

In exchange for borrowing your lecture -which I should say, the students enjoyed enormously-I include Capital , a book to accompany a project I made with Marysia Lewandowska, hosted by Tate Modern and the Bank of England in 2001.

As you will see the project explores via the gift and it’s subsequent debt, themes of value and trust in the parallel symbolic or financial economies that the two institutions preside over. Issues of power haunt Capital, and my decision to appropriate your lecture was an attempt to embody those themes rather than merely talk about them.

Your lecture and its subject -the commodity heart of the art object- and the various anecdotes -painting over the Basquiat signature for instance- brought gasps from the audience, and fit uncannily into my own recent interest. Thank you.

Yours Sincerely,

Neil Cummings

One Guinea

admin — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 14:13:11 +0000

Sub-Title

Chalmers Bequest a project by Elizabeth Price

End Date

7 Jan 2003

Start Date

5 Dec 2002

Location

Hackney Museum: London

Body

One Guinea for the Collection Attendant

We were invited by artist Elizabeth Price to enact Clause Six of the Chalmers Bequest, contained within the Will of Alexander Chalmers.

Elizabeth Price has been working since December 2000 to re-enact each of the clauses contained within the Bequest.

At 5.30 pm on Thursday 12th December 2002 the collection attendant in exchange for the guinea, took the opportunity to share his knowledge of the collection with visitors.

And in keeping with the spirit of the collection –it consists of paintings, sculptures, objects of virtue, souvenirs, mantle-piece decoration and jumble sale trophies - mixed the anecdotal with the factual, the intimate with the official and the contemporary with the historical.

Alexander Henry Chalmers, died in April 1927 aged 78. Buried next to his wife in Abney Park Cemetery, he worked for forty years as a ledger clerk in the Provident Clerks Company in the City of London. On his death his will left money for his family, but not his brother, various hospitals, the bellringer at the Old Church in Stoke Newington, for a church organ, the Lifeboat fund and other charitable trusts, but most importantly of all to care for and continue his collection.

Chalmers wanted to found the nucleus of a public museum in Stoke Newington, as other great men –like Hans Sloane at the British Museum- had done before him; to turn his personal taste into public culture. He bequeathed his life-long collection and money for its continuance to the local authority.

Chalmers collected ‘to mimic the joy afforded him by our great National Treasury of Art’ but his collection was humble, feeble even; limited by lack of funds and even more so by lack of education.

What remains is the ghost of ambition, and evidence of a terrible longing. A longing shared with other collections and collectors, to be remembered after death and live on as a public good.

At the end of the project, the remnants of the Chalmers Bequest returned to the sleep of permanent storage.

Welcome

admin — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 14:08:03 +0000

Sub-Title

Commissioned by Adam Budak and Marta Tarabula to coincide with the international conference on contemporary curatorial practice, Polyphony of Voices in Krakow.

End Date

23 Oct 2002

Start Date

21 Oct 2002

Location

Galeria Zderzak, Krakow Poland

Body

Galeria Zderzak is one of the first ‘commercial’ galleries to grow outside of the state funded system of patronage in Poland. While researching the gallery through its archives, we found video evidence that the director Marta Tarabula had been welcoming visitors and introducing artists at every exhibition opening since 1985.

We edited every welcome together, and this video loop played for the duration of the project; endlessly introducing artists, and welcoming each visitor.

At the projects inauguration, we in turn were introduced and thanked, and the audience welcomed by Marta.

Welcome makes explicit the exchange of obligations between a gallerist, the artist invited to exhibit, and an audience. Although in this instance, we declined the invitation of being promoted by the gallery, and instead Welcome uses the opportunity to assist gallery Zderzak through representing the gallerist Marta Tarabula.

The Polyphony of Voices international conference organized by the Bunkier Sztuki Contemporary Art Gallery in Kraków focused on the problematics of contemporary curatorial practices. One of the conceits of the conference was that each panel made from international curators, would be curated by artists. With contributions from Elmgreen & Dragset, Marysia Lewandowska/Neil Cummings, Andrea Fraser, Azorro Group, Christian Jankowski and Mariola Brillowska.

Andre Fraser's remarks on the conference

performance

Reprise

REPRISE

Souvenir Pamphlet

Rene Gimpel

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One Guinea

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Welcome

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