Sunday 4 January 2009

Working collaboratively on Nedko Solakov's 'A Life in Black and White'.

Up down and across
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I was asked if I wanted to be in a conceptual project at the Biennale of Sydney. The action took place at the AGNSW. The duration piece would last as long as the biennale. The working title 'A life in Black and White by Nedko Solakov.
http://nedkosolakov.net/content/a_life_black__white/index_eng.html 
The idea was to paint the walls of the gallery continually everyday of the week 9 to 5 as workers do. I'm writing on reflection but I think the action went for 6 weeks with rotating shifts. I worked all day one day a week over the biennale.

On one side of the gallery an artist/worker would paint the walls black and on the other side of the vast space the other artist/worker would paint over the previously painted black wall white, and so it would go around and around. The piece had a class factor that I liked very much and a philosophical value that I was attracted too in that of dualism. Were we art painters or craft painters?

The director hated it, so I was told by the exhibition staff in that it was a waste of resources and messed up the major entrance space that it occupied. Cans of used and full cans of paint orderly placed in the gallery piled high up the walls with meters of drop sheets spread out like abstract expressionist references being walked over.

Visitors were absolutely baffled about the absurd pointlessness of what I/we was doing. I felt it to be one of the most profound experiences of my life- as a synthesis of art and life and an irreverent/serious take on meaning of art and the institution. Thanks Nedko.

A Life in Black and White- The Painter or the Painter?


At the Art Gallery of NSW working on the conceptual project: A Life in Black and White by Nedko Solakov.