w e l c o m e t o t h e r e a l w o r l d

The degree show is now completely non-existent. We took it to pieces and then threw the whole thing in the skip. It’s a strange but pleasurable experience to destroy something which you’ve spent so much time and energy on. More people should probably go through this process to teach them not to be so precious about stuff. We remember in first year where they try to get you into that sort of headspace by getting you to make loads of work and not worrying about the consequences. However, the real test is if you can spend literally hundreds of pounds on making something for it only to exist for 6 days. Not that people shouldn’t keep stuff or be proud of what they’re produced. But sometimes it may have served its purpose and it becomes a burden. Our practice and work is potentially much more suited to a commission/residency style; meaning that we really enjoy producing site-specific/experiential art and this means it generally doesn’t have a life outside of that context. This is definitely something to think about moving forward as we have to work out how to exist as artists. We don’t make beautiful objects that people want to hang on their wall or have in their garden, but that’s only one of many avenues to go down. 

Speaking of working out how to be artists, we’re in the process of putting together our application for a studio. Unfortunately, due to the number of applications they’re going to receive, what you’re allowed to send in is quite restrictive; only 5 images with no context other than your answers to 3 questions about what you think you’ll gain from the programme. There are only 8 places and due to being a collaboration we will take up 2 spaces (something we don’t necessarily fully understand and must be due to fire safety etc.). This will either work in our favour, we’re clearly open to working in a shared space, or not because we take up the space of two people but are technically one artist. Either way, we’ll just move on to another place if it doesn’t work out so it’s not the end of the world.

t h e f a t l a d y h a s f i n a l l y s u n g

Our degree how private view was the other night and went really well! lots of people enjoying the mascots and lots of people asking about the 4th floor! This meant we were also able to go round and look at the work of our peers. The first work of interest was Lenny Watson’s piece Trouble in Clubland where she tells the story of live music venues closing down and nightlife culture relocating to small-scale and domestic environments. It’s told through a screen recording of someone searching through YouTube and taking you on a journey through other material. It’s an nicely relative way of using found footage – as opposed to just cutting them together seamlessly, you see the search and the jumps to related videos. You also see that it’s 1.32am when these are being searched for. The environment is key too; a sofa surrounded by the chaos of empty beer cans and cigarette ends. It all contributes to a picture of a group of people sitting around watching/sharing YouTube videos, chatting about what’s happened to the club scene. 

Chloe Abrahams made an exceptionally good film about acting and reality and the lines between them. Needless to say, it was right up our street and we were so excited to feel so manipulated and confused by a work; we continued to think about it much after we left the show, running bits of dialogue through in our heads. The setup was Chloe and her sister were having a conversation, sometimes you could tell they were reading from a script but you weren’t sure if that script was made for/by them or it was a conversation they had overheard or made with someone else. That line of thought is just the tip of the iceberg. We can’t wait to see more of her stuff in the future. 

Connie Search made a discussion between two slide projectors about becoming obsolete. Each slide was another sentence of dialogue, a bit of a one liner but funny all the same. 

Kana Ikezawa was showing some photographs (or potentially videos) on side-by-side screens. We’ve heard Kana speak before about her work and she displays photos of monitors because people expect things to move. A piece of paper will be dismissed but we expect TV screens to display moving images. 

Emma Clayton made a film about falling from great heights which was positioned on a back to back TV screens suspended from the roof, viewable from the second-floor bridge. The film was strangely hypnotic, perhaps due to the excellent positioning. 

Billy Sassi started a bowling team called The Bad Boy Bowlers. His work is made up of merchandise, trophies, framed team photographs, and a documentary. It’s all set up like the domestic shrine of an amateur sporting enthusiast. It’s very thorough and planned, it all fits very snug together. 

Elliot Hewgill’s film brings previously unfeeling cables to life. Personified with a demon-like voice we hear about the frustrations of the life hacker who wants all their cables neat and tidy using paper clips or specially constructed desks. The cable drawing is a really great touch, we always enjoy when people are able to incorporate the essential elements of an installation into their work. 

Campbell McConnell has managed to increase the production of his usual bizarre performances to bring us a Roman table tennis tournament complete with singing assistants and a procession of a cardboard Trojan Horse. Truly insane. 

Finally, there’s Sophie Popper’s incredible audio guide which takes you on a rhyming journey down the main exhibition space, discussing the potential conversations that might occur while viewing the work on display. It’s both very fun and comical but also delivers thoughtful critique. Taking the platform of the degree show and running with it. It’s been a good 4 years, we’ve all done pretty well.

d e g r e e s h o w s e a s o n i s u p o n u s

Made a venture over to Tate Modern to see some new additions to the tanks, unfortunately the most anticipated work (Jordan Wolfson’s giant animatronic puppet) was closed for maintenance. However, we did still get to see Joan Jonas and Pierre Huyghe and Philippe Parreno’s project No Ghost Just a shell. Joan Jonas was a little busy for us; lots of energy and curiosity, you can tell she runs with her intuition, unabashed and unafraid to see where things will go. Nothing really moved us, and often her art seems like a grand exercise in misdirection. Who is Joan Jonas, and where is she? Drawing lines in the sand, a shadow on the beach grass. We weren’t convinced.

No Ghost Just a Shell however is something we’ve been aware of for a while, ever since seeing an aspect of it at a show at Zabludowicz some time ago. The basic idea is that Huyghe and Parreno purchased the cartoon character AnnLee from a Japanese manga company and this then lead to a succession of pieces beginning with a poster designed by M/M, followed by films made by Parreno, Huyghe, and other big artists such as Liam Gillick and Rirkrit Tiravanija. It brings up all these exciting questions about the status of the image, of representation, of beings in the world of the character, and on the very polyphony of the work. It was great to see so many aspects of the work in one space. 

We also went to the Slade degree show opening which was fun and informative. We always find that it ends up being lots of stuff that looks like art which is mostly always the way at a degree show but specifically with Slade and Goldsmiths. It’s all very well made and looks like the inside of an art gallery in a cartoon. However, there was still a number of works we picked up on, the first being a beautiful animation by Frederick Freebury Williams.

Shenece Oretha had made an entire room into her work in a very precise way; the space was a round room painted orange room with speakers all around the outside pointing in. You could hear all different voices telling different stories. Really well produced, intentional work. 

Milan Tarascas was doing a performance where he was playing some sculptures/musical instruments. The objects looked like to love child a Henry Moore and a guitar. Quite amazingly strange creations. They were being played by Milan and some additional performers/musicians. They were all wearing these plain robes which were also quite fascinating. It felt like the performance version of ‘things that look like art’ – it’s always difficult for us to get our heads round the artistic licence of the way a work looks since we tend to go down a fairly logical route.

Finally we had Kara Chin who had gone all out on their work about basil. The room was full of stuff from giant wall to floor wooden frames to pots of basil growing under lights. Our favourite aspect was a beautiful mechanised cog which brought a blind up and down by just continuously turning. For us could have a work on its own; an empty room with blackout blinds going up and down but obviously this is a different work for another day.

t w e n t y s e v e n g r a n d l a t e r . . .

Everything’s finished and even though it’s not all perfect, we feel as if we’ve made some progress in a variety of ways during this project. We’re actually quite looking forward to the degree show now; getting to talk with people about the work and also just revealing it to the public in general. 

On a slightly more negative note, the website looks absolutely awful. All the text is on top of each other rendering it almost completely illegible. A lot of the images don’t load on the page and the whole thing is on a black background! And supposedly it also cost £700 which is probably one of the reasons why there’s now NO FREE DRINKS at the degree show private view. We always thought that it was ticketed because of the free drinks but now it feels completely pointless. Anyway, enough moaning! It’s going to be great.

a l l d e g r e e s h o w a n d n o p l a y m a k e s s i d a n d j i m d u l l

We’re now in our spaces for the degree show! The information stand is all put together and the first bit of vinyl are on which is exciting and stressful. We’re just a little bit away from the entrance which feels appropriate for the subject matter. Video for the screens is getting there, getting the mascot designs to remind people to take their key for the lift or see the sculpture garden. We’ve also finished writing the stories which means we need to quickly get down to designing the leaflets and print them as soon as we can.

The mascot heads are looking great too, the felt is on and there’s just one to construct now. The cut outs have been cut too, just need to print them off and build stands for them and we’ll be good to go.