Wednesday 9 April 2008

SHCF response

A provocation, time specificity, a key word – infinite.

Just words, a mixture of vowels and consonants typed on a page, could be any page in any order, yet when re read the power within these words is their very essence, the poetics of what they are, simple yet complex.

They invite the reader to invest imagination!
Their beauty is what they offer, a world beyond the type face.

It is this poetry that the Russian Formalists wished to free from the page, ridding the text of the shackles of author and manipulation by authority or those who sought to control.

Viktor Shklovsky et al and their notion of ‘defamiliarization’ is explored in “Art as Technique” * A seminal essay on the poetics and mechanics of the written word in 1917; It is this essay that the M.A. fine art students from Sheffield Hallam University have chosen to explore to facilitate debate and discussion on its continued relevance to artists’ curators and theorists in the 21st century.

With an overarching theme of Defamiliarization running through their research the artists and curators from Sheffield Hallam University have used imagination to respond to the provocation set by their hosts.

At the Gallery at Wimbledon College of Art on the 14th of April 2008“ One Night stand” A series of three one night events hosted by the MA Critical Writing & Curatorial Practice students of Chelsea College of Art and Design in collaboration with the curating students of Essex and Sheffield Hallam Universities.

The Sheffield Hallam University artists/curators will exhibit their new work with their invited artists in response to “infinite” and “Time Specificity”.
This event will be part of an ongoing collaboration with MA curating students from UAL Chelsea and Essex University.

*Lemon, LT et al. (1965) ‘Russian Formalist Criticism Four Essays’ University Press of Nebraska
(1917) ‘Art as Technique’ arguably nearly one century later still a key text in the debate of the role of contemporary art.

For further information
www.sheffieldhallamcuratorsforum.blogspot.com

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