Here's the rationale: "Collecting can be seen as a hobby or complete mania. It can be innocent or completely obsessive. We all collect in one way or another, and sometimes what we collect can surprise ourselves as well as others. For this project you will be working rom a collection that can be as wide, diverse, and varied as you want it to be. It may not be your collection but it must be a collection that you find interesting and be physically accessible. Think about ideas associated with collections - dispaly, arrangement, pattern repetition, seriality. Things that you collect wiususlaly have apersonal meaning for you and pefully your work will take on a personal meaning too."
Last year the Tate did some leaflets about different ways of collecting - or rather, classifying - pictures:
Till 23 August, Tate Britain has an interesting free exhibition called "Classified". As an ex-librarian, I found it fascinating. In the first room, ticking metronomes round the walls, and in the middle, the display cabinet with Mark Dion's finds from the banks of the Thames in 1999 (yes it's ok to open the drawers). There's Damien Hirst's "Pharmacy" too. Its final room contains "The Chapman Family Collection" - amusing and thought-provoking -- which brings to mind Henry Wellcome's extensive collection, on display at the Wellcome Institute on Euston Road.Getting back to the homework brief: "Research other artists or designers who have worked with collections and keep visual and written notes, including examples of thier work. Some artists: Giorgio Morandi, Joseph Cornell, Robert Rauschenberg, Andy Warhol, Michael Craig Martin, Lisa Milroy, Fiona Rae, Philip Taffe, Ellen Gallagher, Andrew Grassie, Fred Tomaselli, Mark Wallinger, Anja Gallacio, Grayson Perry, Rachel Whiteread, Susan Hillier, Darren Almond, Daniel Liebeskind, Ieoh Ming Pei, Maya Lin, Sue Lawty, Deirdrie Nelson, Shirley Chubb."
Two book recommendations: Art and Artifact: The museum as a medium, and Deep Storage: Collecting, storing and archiving in art.
And some online resources:
http://www.artthrob.co.za/01june/news.html
www.artmuseums.harvard.edu/sketchbooks/
www.aaa.si.edu/guides/site-visual/index.cfm
more sketch books at these sites
http://www.artsjournal.com/artopia/2006/01/rauschenbergs_combines.html
Art from recycled materials:
http://www.johndahlsen.com/lastest_installation.html
Posters:
http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/posters
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/turnerprize/history
Hi Margaret, Saw your article about starting a collection for your course. Don't know if you're read it or not, but a great book showing 1 man's collection is Alan Fletcher's book "The Art of Looking Sideways"? It took him 18yrs to write and is filled with little snippets of quotes, graphic designs, sketchbook drawings etc. that he had collected all his life. It's a very interesting book
ReplyDeleteHave a particular fondness for the quirkier museums - is the John Soane Museum still as quirky as it used to be? Also Victorian botanical/zoological collections. Not to mention the bits of the collection not actually on display at any one time - Leeds City Museum stores are open one afternoon a week: wonder if you could get into see the storage areas of some of the London museums? And I've always been fascinated by the thin line between a collector and an obsessive - if there is a line at all in some cases? Or between obsessive/collective/artist.
ReplyDeleteThen of course there's collections that have meanings specific for those who collected them that have little if anything to do with the objects themselves (my house is full of things like that). It could be a fascinating study - just how do you fit it all into a summer?