Recreating the self is a natural product of cultural memory, it is not something that is stored like a permanent cache. Remembering is imagining, so every time one forms a memory, one is just recreating it to form one’s selfhood, to give oneself a narrative.
Paul Pfeiffer, ‘Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse’, 2003–18
Interview
In the Maze
Paul Pfeiffer interviewed by Adam Heardman
The term ‘in media res’ – entering into a situation in the middle of it – to me describes any first-person-shooter game, learning the game by being in it. In media res becomes a new kind of narrative structure in which one wakes up in the maze and then learns the dimensions of the maze from within.
Gillian Wearing, I signed on and they would not give me nothing, from the series ‘Signs that Say What You Want Them To Say and Not Signs that Say What Someone Else Wants You To Say’, 1992–93
Feature
The Letter of the Law
Is it possible, Chris Townsend asks, for contemporary artists to rescue language from the clutches of commodity culture
Gillian Wearing’s photographic series ‘Signs that Say…’ restores the word to subjects whose lives are almost entirely structured by the language of the administrative state and capital.
Vinca Petersen, Speaker Man, 1996
Feature
Rave and Resist
Ben Burbridge considers the countercultural history of rave culture in the UK as an unfulfilled promise for a new politics of the left
Far from being the final nail in the coffin for Britain’s countercultural imaginary, the draconian Criminal Justice Act was another expression of neoliberal anxiety regarding experiments in unalienated creativity and collective joy.
From the Back Catalogue Irreplaceable
Oreet Ashery interviewed by Larne Abse Gogarty. First published in 2014, now free online.
Stanley Schtinter, Important Books (or, Manifestos Read by Children), 2021–22
Profile
Stanley Schtinter
Morgan Quaintance
Stanley Schtinter’s new film will, according to the artist, ‘only ever show in its analogue format, so it will always be an event to travel to and never streaming or screening digitally’. For Schtinter, the political power of collective viewing is something worth fighting for.
sponsored
Editorial
Forged in Fire
LA’s wildfires, driven by the climate crisis, left more than just ash in their wake: they revealed a sense of solidarity and a collective desire to help that we all will need in the coming years.
While firefighters battled the blaze, the rest of the world watched in horror as the events unfolded on their screens, like a Hollywood disaster movie but in real time, a hellish vision of the future of the planet.
sponsored
Artnotes
California Burning
The LA art world is caught up in the devastating urban wildfires; artists and galleries count the cost of storm recovery; former DCMS minister Margaret Hodge is appointed to lead the government review of ACE; New Contemporaries artists protest against the show’s sponsorship; Candida Gertler resigns from all UK arts institutions following Turner Prize artists’ protest against Tate’s links to the Outset art charity she co-founded; Argentina’s far-right government closes the Haraldo Conti Centre; Outpost Studios artists are evicted by Norwich Council; plus the latest on galleries, people, awards and more.
Hans Haacke, Germania, 1993
Exhibitions
Hans Haacke: Retrospective
Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt
George Macbeth
Hamad Butt: Apprehensions
IMMA, Dublin
Chris McCormack
Maud Sulter: You are my kindred spirit
Tramway, Glasgow
Amna Malik
Electric Dreams: Art and Technology Before the Internet
Tate Modern, London
Tom Seymour
Alex Margo Arden: Safety Curtain
Auto Italia, London
Cherry Smyth
Özgür Kar: HEAVY GROUND
Emalin, London
Maria Walsh
Philippe Parreno: Voices
Haus der Kunst, Munich
Michael Kurtz
Not Going It Alone
Books
Not Going It Alone: Collective Curatorial Curating
Pablo Luis Alvarez
While ‘curatorial authority’ still finds a niche for survival, a less macho and more self-effacing understanding of curating is increasingly prevalent today.
John Smith, Being John Smith, 2023
Film
John Smith: Being John Smith
Erika Balsom
Every second of the film is as sharp as a diamond, with no trace of the confessional narcissism that is so prevalent elsewhere today.
Jean-Luc Godard, Scénarios, 2024
Film
Jean-Luc Godard: Scénario(s)
Alex Fletcher
In his comments, Jean-Luc Godard is both direct, offering practical advice to his collaborators about what images to include in certain sequences, but also intentionally oblique – he quips about the final image that it ‘doesn’t mean anything’.
No Other Land, 2024, dir by Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor
Film
International Documentary Film Festival: Amsterdam
Rachel Pronger
No Other Land found itself at home alongside other films which, despite their different angles, ultimately wrestled with the same questions. How far can we be neutral observers? And what happens when those who document become part of the story? As Leila Amini put it in a post-screening Q&A: ‘Do you shoot the house on fire, or do you stop to help?’
Dam Van Huynh and Elaine Mitchener, Graffiti Bodies II, 2024
Sound
Deep Time: Basquiat and Cage 84.24
Dan Kidner
The festival’s title signalled Elaine Mitchener’s intention to ‘imagine a conversation’ between John Cage and Jean Michel-Basquiat, drawing on the historical fact that in 1984 Fruitmarket staged concurrent solo exhibitions by the artists.
Yoshinori Niwa, Cleaning a Poster During the Election Period Until It Is No Longer Legible, 2024
Reports
Letter from Graz
Miriam Stoney
In Yoshinori Niwa’s 2024 durational performance Cleaning a Poster During the Election Period Until It Is No Longer Legible, the aesthetics of populist politics are quite literally washed away by a repeated and really meticulous labour of cleansing.
‘Land of Fire’, Kunsthalle Bega
Reports
Letter from Timisoara
Jelena Sofronijevic
Internationalising Romanian art is one option, though the country refuses ‘biennialisation’, instead prioritising local benefits.
Maurizio Cattelan, Comedian, 2019, estimated at $1m–1.5m, sold for $6.25m
Salerooms
New York Sales
Colin Gleadell
As cryptocurrency evangelists and digital art collectors like Snoop Dogg get more involved in bidding at art auctions, we can expect to see continuous change in the content of contemporary art sales, especially if those changes spell ‘M-O-N-E-Y’.
cover of the government’s ‘AI Opportunities Action Plan’
Artlaw
Copyright and AI Consultation
Henry Lydiate
DCMS minister Chris Bryant was reminded that the average UK visual artist earned below the minimum wage and relied on their copyright royalties to continue their practices, and was asked to give assurances that ‘the plans for a copyright exception for AI learning will not further contribute to that financial instability and weaken the lifeblood of our creative economy’.
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Bharti Kher in Conversation Tate St Ives, Saint Ives, Sat 1 Feb 11.00am
12 Hour Acting Up Symposium Cooper Gallery, Dundee, Sat 1 Feb 11.00am
Online Talk: I Spend Hours Each Day Picking Up Fragments CCA, Glasgow, Mon 3 Feb 5.00pm
Lunchbreak Guitar Concert: Ian Watt Aberdeen Art Gallery, Aberdeen, Thu 6 Feb 12.45pm
Dementia Friendly Activity: Strike! Exhibition and Printmaking National Museum Cardiff, Cardiff, Thu 6 Feb 1.30pm
‘Ancestral Avant-Gardes’ Conference Organised by Claire Bishop artresearch.mmu.ac.uk A one-day event addressing the resurgence of interest in ‘ancestralism’ among performance and visual artists, who hark back to traditional or indigenous forms of collective knowledge. How might we develop a critical vocabulary for approaching work that requires not just participation, but also an openness to the spiritual?
Manchester School of Art, Manchester Metropolitan University 21 Mar
promoted
The Color Black with Mohsen Mostafavi and Peter Märkli Royal Academy of Arts, London, Thu 6 Feb 6.30pm
Maud Sulter Live Programme: Poetry in Motion Tramway, Glasgow, Fri 7 Feb 7.00pm
Free Family Workshops for Children with SEND Autograph, London, Sat 8 Feb 10.00am
Queer Goddexes and Speculative Scripts Workshop Mimosa House, London, Sat 8 Feb 2.00pm
Talks about Belkis Ayón: Nkame Modern Art Oxford, Oxford, Sat 8 Feb 3.00pm
Talks on Everyday Imaging: The Self-Centred and the Networked The Photographers’ Gallery, London, Thu 13 Feb 3.00pm
Find local shows with the Art Monthly gallery maps!
Podcasts
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On iTunes
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Dec: Mark Prince discusses postwar US modernist abstraction as a form of cultural protectionism.
Oct: Bob Dickinson discusses artists who connect the sleep crisis to the climate crisis, while Tom Denman reviews the ‘Towards New Worlds’ exhibition at MIMA in Middlesbrough.
Sep: Michael Kurtz discusses the work of Delcy Morelos; Lauren Velvick on Roy Claire Potter’s ‘The Wastes’; Sarah E James examines the exhibition as performance.
The most significant award for emerging artists working in the field of sculpture in the UK: offering £10,000 in financial support towards the making of new work, plus a funded solo show at Standpoint Gallery. Standpoint Gallery, London | 12 Mar 2025 standpointlondon.co.uk
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Open Call - Outdoor Suspended Sculpture Installation
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