Dear all,

Does anybody who is good on this area of surveillance fancy writing this - if you do please get back to me in the next 2 days.

Thanks,

David.


Dr David Wood

Managing Editor
Surveillance & Society
http://www.surveillance-and-society.org/

[log in to unmask]


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Adriana Marques
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Monday, January 24, 2005 9:42 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Exhibition "Human Nature"
> 
> Dear David Wood,
> 
> I am a freelance curator currently organising an
> exhibition at the Pump
> House Gallery in Battersea Park. Titled Human
> Nature, this international
> group exhibition explores our human voyeuristic
> tendencies in
> contemporary society, and how spaces and
> surveillance alters our
> actions.  Bringing together new work that has not
> been exhibited before
> in London, by established artists, the work will
> visually dissect our
> reactions to spatial and social environments, and
> our fascination with
> analysing human behaviour.
> 
> I have found your journal, Society & Surveillance,
> not only incredibly
> useful and interesting for the critical and
> theoretical underpinnings of
> this exhibition, but it has also led me to realise
> that contemporary
> voyeurism and its impact on society is a subject
> that requires greater
> acknowledgement and circulation.
> 
> With this aim, I am writing to you in hope that you,
> or one of your
> writers, may be interested in contributing a small
> essay for the
> exhibition catalogue.  A full colour, 32 page
> catalogue, in an edition
> of 1000, will be published with a Pump House Gallery
> ISBN, in April
> 2005.  We are still in the process of securing
> funding, so I could not
> promise any remuneration at this point, but of
> course, if enough
> sponsorship is found, I would be happy to discuss a
> fee.  Printing
> deadlines are also looming quickly, and we would
> require a first draft
> by the end of February.  I understand that this is a
> very short
> deadline, but would very much appreciate your
> consideration.
> 
> Drawing inspiration from Battersea Park's rich
> history of illegal
> gambling grounds, then transformed into moral
> gardens for 'healthful
> recreation', I believe this timely exhibition will
> expand and creatively
> critique our era of reality television, surveillance
> cameras, and
> videophones; for it seems that presently nothing
> captivates us more than
> our own actions.
> 
> It would be a privilege to inculde and credit
> Society & Surveillance in
> our exhibition.  Please do let me know if you would
> be interested in
> discussing this project any further by contacting me
> via this email, or
> on 07763 114620.
> 
> I look forward to hearing from you.
> Many thanks,
> Adriana
> 
> Adriana Marques


pump house gallery   PRESS RELEASE

 
Marcus Coates, Journey to the Lower World       Human Nature
Marcus Coates, Ellen Lesperance & Jeanine Oleson, Heather & Ivor Morrison, Yoshua Okon, Gerry Smith, Gitte Villesen, Zöe Walker

Curated by Erica Burton, 
Rebecca Harris, Adriana Marques, Victoria Preston, Sarah Schuster 

20 April - 5 June, 2005
Private view: 19 April, 7-9pm
Wednesday to Sunday and Bank Holidays
11am - 5pm (Friday and Saturdays 11am - 4pm)

Human Nature is a group exhibition that bridges primitive instincts and contemporary social conditioning.  There has always existed a symbiotic relationship between humans and nature, but has our evolution out of primeval existence severed our dependence on natural surroundings, and erased any animalistic intuitions?  Or has contemporary culture, fuelled by populist reality television, national surveillance cameras, and fashionable camera phones, simply led us to over-analyse our every move, forcing us to question our instinctive actions? The internationally renowned artists in Human Nature, through comic dialogue, and honest exploration, visually dissect us as a socially and physically located species.  Asking what relationship we currently hold with natural landscapes, and how being watched effects our oscillation between performing and hiding in public spaces, Human Nature covers the uncovered ground in this well trodden territory.  Resting between pre-modern environments, and accepted social codes, these contemporary artists expose issues such as our performative nature when faced with cameras, the emotional short fallings of idyllic landscapes, the recreational relationships we forge with nature, and our deep rooted animal nature. Exhibiting film, photography, sculpture, painting, sound and mail art, the artists in Human Nature essentially investigate our reactions to spatial and social environments, opening a fluid discussion on what it is to be human.

In 1858, Battersea Park was developed from an area of fields, into a cultivated park to provide "healthful recreation" and promote morality.  Then in 1951, the park was further augmented to hold the Pleasure Gardens, a fairground attraction built to raise the moral after the devastating world wars.  Now spotted with surveillance cameras, we ask if it really the park really has become somewhere to escape to, and if the act of being watched induces moral behaviour.  Through Human Nature, the Pump House Gallery now contextualises this history by exploring contemporary conduct. 

Marcus Coates, previously renown for his affecting blurring of animal and human behaviour, and animal parodies, presents a new film commissioned by Film London, Journey to the Lower World (2004), harking back to animal influences of Shamanism.  Gitte Villesen, who will represent Denmark in this year's Venice Biennale, shows her most famed film, Vorbosse Horse Market and Fair (Young One) (1995), extending her practice of investigating other people's lives and their response to the rules that define us within accepted reality.  The self created landscapes of Zöe Walker, the master of transportable paradises, are shown here in Somewhere Special (1999), where her ideal landscape can be transported in her back-pack, questioning the emotional satisfaction found in idyllic landscapes.  Mexican multi-media artist, Yoshua Okon, reduces the human species to their most primitive form, in his satirical, yet visually arresting, human documentary Crabby.  The large format, performative photographs of American duo, Ellen Lesperance and Jeanine Oleson, take us back to a fantasy land, where true natural instincts act beyond social expectations.  British painter Gerry Smith, dramatically reinforces the loss of identity in the meeting of animal intuition and social code in his painting Respectful Silence.  The Morrison's, present anonymous sound and mail art, collect details from everyday life, merging objective details of natural surroundings with subjective storytelling, illustrating that in nature is where we are most ourselves. 



Courtesy of Marcus Coates, Ellen Lesperance & Jeanine Oleson, Heather & Ivan Morison, Yoshua Okon and Avelino Marin Meroño, Gerry Smith and Danielle Arnaud, Gitte Villesen, Zöe Walker

With generous support from Tropic Invest
and generous in-kind support from Film and Video Umbrella  [logo here]

Supported by MA Creative Curating, Goldsmiths College  


Notes to Editors:

For further information and images please contact Sandra Ross at [log in to unmask] Tel: 020 7350 0523.

A full events program, including artist talks, a curator's gallery tour, and children's workshops will be running in conjunction with Human Nature.  Please contact Sandra Ross for further details at [log in to unmask] Tel: 020 7350 0523.


Human Nature was curated by postgraduate students on the MA Creative Curating course at Goldsmiths College, University of London:

Erica Burton is an independent curator working in London and Reading.  She was recently Arts Coordinator at a Reading Art in the Centre project with artist Adam Dant.  She graduated in fine art and philosophy at the University of Reading and has been active in visual arts and marketing at Wolverhampton Art Gallery, Matts Gallery, and the Institute of Contemporary Art, London. 

Rebecca Harris is an independent curator working in London.  She graduated in Art History from the University of East Anglia and was in editorial and research at Modern Painters magazine.  She has worked in commercial art galleries in press and marketing and was gallery co-ordinator for Andrew Mummery, and exhibition co-ordinators assistant for Habitat.  In 2004 she organized an exhibition of four young photographers.     

Adriana Marques is an independent curator currently working in London. She graduated in Contemporary Arts from Nottingham Trent and began working as Front of House Manager for NOW and EXPO art festivals, where she worked with local and visiting artists managing public performances and installations.  She then moved to New York where she worked for the Aperture Photography Foundation as Gallery Manager, curating over ten exhibitions.  

Victoria Preston is an independent curator working in the UK and Switzerland.  A graduate of Oxford University and INSEAD, she is founder of the Art Advisory Service at UBS, former Vice President of Art for the World, and a trustee of Parabola, a new commissioning agency for contemporary art.  In 2004 she commissioned Playground, a public sculpture in London by artists Shirazeh Houshiary and Pip Horne.    

Sarah Schuster is an independent curator working in the US and London.  She graduated from the Maine College of Art in Sculpture and Art History, and went on to work as Gallery Manager and Assistant Curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Portland, Maine, where she handled all front of house matters and was an active part of the curatorial team for over twenty exhibitions.