Placement: On wall and floor
-
Background
The background in a photo by Russian artist Alexander Rodchenko of fellow artists Varvara Stepanova, is in shadow. Stepanova is in the foreground looking towards her right. She wears a dress made from fabric printed with a pattern of her own design.
Varying geometric densities of background darkness reveal the angle Rodchenko had taken the photo, so that everything appears to tilt downwards into the lefthand corner. Rhythmic alternations between dark and light in Stepanova’s dress pattern push, however, against this force. The pattern’s dynamic might counteracts the background’s slipping gravity to steady the image upright. All this creates a lot of tension in the image, against which Stepanova appears calm, if not jubilant.
We can see all this in a framed reproduction of the photo that is part of the artwork ‘Background’. It represents Rodchenko’s photo arrayed with vertical watercolour stripes aligning with an equalised balance between the photo’s opposing forces.
A background painting hanging on the wall behind Stepanova forms a diagonal darkness isolated on the righthand side of the sculptuation’s framed reproduction.
The dark corner hovers between a two-dimensional depth within the photo and a three-dimensional void missing from a pedestal outside the photo.
The sculptuation’s crux centres on a debate concerning the backgrounds. Whether it is an artist’s biographical background or a room’s background space that fills the pedestal’s missing shadow. Either way, the work is not ready for exhibition until a resolution one way or the other completes the work. The watercolour reads:
ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF A BACKGROUND
A debate ensues. Not until a pedestal’s missing corner is found, can a framed photocopy of Varvara Stepanova be placed on top. Some argue the background of Stepanova completes the pedestal. Others argue the very room within which one stands is the background that completes the pedestal. Meanwhile, the eleventh hour approaches and the exhibition has soon to open. -
behind you: red
ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF MEMORY IN ART
‘That’s opposite to how I see it’, said the artist. ‘The artwork’s whole consists of a small actual part and a large thought part, behind you.’ ‘No, no, no’, replied the viewer. ‘It consists of a large actual part and a small thought part, behind you.’
Details on the watercolour floorplan read as follows:
- stairs
- stares
- 20
- x
- 20
- Where ‘x’ is the measurement of space between a memory and the place the memory comes from.
-
behind you: blue
ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF ART IN MISSING MOMENTS
Where they were searching the future’s dark night for the star-bright moment missing from their present; without realising it is not missing, but always in memory — behind you.
floorplan details:
- stairs
- stares
- missing moment
-
plans
plans as seen at Heide 1, photo: John Brash 
photo: Albert Tucker, Arvo Tea: Sidney Nolan, Sunday Reed and Joy Hester 1945, gelatin silver photograph, 30.4 x 40.3 cm, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Gift of Barbara Tucker 2001; As quoted from the Heide Guide Book of 2003: ‘”Arvo Tea”, was a daily ritual at Heide at 4pm’. 
photo: John Brash; Thanks to Heide gallery staff who maintained afternoon tea at 4pm; Thanks here to Rebecca Renshaw (left) and Maria Davies (right). The sculptural situation ‘plans’, 2003, crams into the front room at Heide I. It doesn’t fit the exhibition room. Against the furthest wall a stack of plywood blocks form a cube on an angle at odds with the exhibition room. It juts out into the room at an orientation of its own determination instead of aligning with the room’s walls. The exhibition room does not determine the space of the artwork, its ‘x’ and ‘y’ axes. The sculptural situation creates its own spatial axes.
The space a sculptural situation creates is an ongoing process that begins so as to reach an end, a conclusion. Yet, its ending forever returns to its beginning. The work remains incomplete even though its form, its process, is a complete form.
Without a plinth’s elevation into a symbolic space, a sculptural situation remains on the messy ground of the everyday where it has to work to create, then recreate, its space over again. Its space isn’t a given. The artwork has to build it.
A sculptural situation is, therefore, a plan forever being built. The physical components of the work help to build its space. They, themselves, are not ‘the sculpture’ but always the pencilled-in parts of its plan.
In plans at Heide I, nothing of this ‘plan’ fits. It is out of kilt.
The door? Well, it’s not been built yet. The rest of ‘house c’ has, but not the door. They forgot, somehow. Without it, we can’t enter to hang the painting as per our plan. They said they hope to finish it before afternoon tea. That’s at four.
At four o’clock each day visitors happened to be looking at ‘plans’, gallery staff would at that moment wheel a tea trolley into the exhibition room. The workers in the watercolours wait for afternoon tea before they can complete their task of hanging a painting inside House C. Afternoon Tea at 4:00pm creates a coincidence between the watercolours’ awaited moment and that moment taking place.
An exhibition brochure accompanies the work with a text that does not explain the work but is, instead, a background text.
Encyclopaedia watercolour one details, above fireplace at right on entry to the room; photo: Brenton McGeachie 
photo: Brenton McGeachie; Note: the horizontal wall midway through ‘house c’ in each Encyclopaedia watercolour is the wall of the actual room, with individual wooden blocks stacked in front of the wall and a pencilled in door (yet to be built). The three paintings hanging in the exhibition room are the paintings referred to in the watercolours. The blocks in each painting correspond to the wooden blocks stacked in the room with an entrance door stencilled on top. -
Negative space.1
Encyclopaedia of hidden messages
The undercover intelligence agent looked for the secret message code name negative space hidden
here, somewhere, but couldn’t find it.
– chair -
setting the scene for nobody
Finish setting the scene for nobody by checking whether you have put in place the:
1. row of paintings nobody likes? yes / no
2. corner protectors for marks nobody leaves? yes / no
3. ringing of a telephone that nobody can answer? yes / no
4. photographs of corner-paintings taken with nobody in mind? yes / no
5. copies of an art catalogue that nobody reads? yes / no
6. doorway through which nobody will enter? yes / no
7. poster for a sculptural situation that nobody will see? yes / no
8. empty ledge, upon which rests the moment that waits for nobody? yes / noChecked? Sign the time _____ and date_____ then quickly depart before nobody sees you.
_________
from the Encyclopaedia of setting scenes
page 160301
a. table, with telephone and catalogue on top
b. empty space on a wall in a cafe where there was once a poster for a cultural situation
c. meeting place where secret agent black is to recognise secret agent blue by the matching half of a poster they both cary
d. a noisy corner where echoes telephone rings and pauses
e. an empty ledge upon which rests the moment that awaits nobody_________
art catalogue that nobody reads:
for an exhibition nobody went to
Fergus Armstrong : a letter to the people of 5,000 years hence from a Japanese school child included in the Expo ‘70 capsule in Osaka;
Sandra Bridie: her Gallery and Museums Studies Resarch Quaestions, entitled ‘Artists as Curators’, left unanswered;
Andrew Hurle: two empty forms;
Gail Hastings: an excerpt from an article on the architecture of James Birrell to be published in Monument Magazine. -
situation no. 41: happy new year
Situation no. 41 begins with a happy new year card
posted to regular gallery visitors before
the exhibition commences
ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Blue: Did you read what was handwritten on those cards?
Grey: You didn’t look, did you?
PAGE 9– data room
————————————ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Blue: Of course, didn’t you? How could one help but look — they’re there, aren’t they?
Grey: But a card is private, in a public sort of way.
PAGE 9– passageway for those who looked
– passageway for those who didn’t
– looking library
– storage room for lost plinths kept in corners that can’t be found
– library of repetitions in art
– chair
– first floor: repeated colours
– second floor: repeated stripes
– the orange phase where everything happens twice
————————————ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Blue: Private or not, I’ll tell you one thing, the design’s been done before. It’s a copy of a famous fabric pattern I’ve seen in a museum, somewhere.
PAGE 9– data room
————————————ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Grey: Everything, these days, seems to have been done before. Everything’s a repeat of something else.
Blue: Yes, but sometime’s there’s a difference, isn’t there?
PAGE 9– waiting room
– a different chair to sit in after painting a coat of green
– ‘untitled green: to be repeated’, painted green, five times
– corner where someone once whispered ‘happy new year’
———————————ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Grey: Maybe in time and space, but so what? If I were playing my favourite record and it got stuck, midway — repeating the same thing over and over — I would change it.
PAGE 9– data room
———————————ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Blue: Of course! And if it didn’t get stuck you would play in only once.
PAGE 9– leaning room, for one red painting only
– split room
– where someone waits for the red painting to be hung, listening to the same sad song three times
– where no one waits
———————————ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Grey: Only once! Are you crazy? I play my favourites again and again. But that’s different, isn’t it? Anyway, don’t you have a meeting at the Bureau* to go to?
PAGE 9– data room
———————————ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Blue: Yes. They want me to look at some results of a survey they conducted recently; something about ‘temporal spacings of repetitions’ in art. They’re meant to be quite pleasing.
PAGE 9– where someone telephoned someone else, to invite them to look at the latest survey’s painted results, but got an engaged signal
– stairs that go nowhere
– stares that come back
– empty centre of the data room where information collected from undercover investigations is leaked
– room for a mathematician equipped with survey results, calculator and stamp pad; and the hope to measure difference in time’s repetition
———————————ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Grey: Pleasing? I’ve heard that they’re just stripes — again!
*Bureau of Repetitions in Art
PAGE 9– data room
———————————BUREAU OF REPETITIONS IN ART
Due to an increasing demand to investigate the temporal spacings of repetitions in art, the Bureau has finally devised the following survey and requires your assistance to complete it.
Your instructions are to receive eight ‘happy new year’ greetings cards (designed specifically for this project) posted to you on separate days. Upon receiving each card, please mark the date and time on the adjacent form.
The data thus collected will then be analysed by our mathematicians, who will make public the results in the form of a wall painting.
We thank you, in advance, for your participation, and ensure that the covert nature of this investigation is necessary to further our understanding of art.
PARTICIPANT TYPE: N – CURATOR OF CONTEMPORARY ART
-
mission: untitled (blue)
Above and first image below, as seen in ‘Projections’ at the David Pestorius Gallery, Berlin, in 1999. The painting, Kaiserdamm bag and There: Contemporary Art Magazine components of the sculptuation all feature in a film ‘mission: untitled (blue)’. The grid of orange circles on the cover of There is a plan view of a Berlin underpass. The dashed line and arrow show where, in the film, the lost object — the blue painting — can be found leaning against one of the underpass’ orange pillars, reached by getting off at the Kaiserdamm station. Thanks go to Robert Forster from The Go-Betweens for allowing the inclusion of ‘Long Lonely Day’ from The Lost Album. The sculptuation was re-exhibited at ACCA, Melbourne, in 2001. The object furniture for each screening was handmade by Gail Hastings.
A storyboard rendition of the film, below.
-
difficult art decisions: wall six
Encyclopaedia of Difficult Art Decisions
After installing this artwork on wall 6 we stepped back to admire our handwork when our attention was drawn to a chair nearby. On the chair was a cushion made from the same vinyl material. Now we’re not authorities on art, but it seemed obvious to us that this coincidental situation confused the distinction between what was art and what was not. Concerned that viewers might mistakenly read an ‘intention’ into the coincidence we resolved to change the cushion. The other cushions, however, all resembled the first. The decision as to which was the ‘least’ confusing became, therefore, too difficult to make. We filed a ‘Difficult Art Decision’ report so as to have an art authority solve the situation. The other cushions will remain from this time [18:50] and day [Montag, 15 Sep 1958] until such moment as the final decision has been made.page 46
[floor plan details]
– shelved Difficult Art Decision reports awaiting the attention of art authorities
– double-sided shelves
===
– counter for submitting Difficult Art Decision reports
===
– room 4 of no chairs
– table for deferring a decision until tomorrow (and tomorrow again)
– table for measuring the degree of a decision’s difficulty
===
– chair 3 room
===
– cushion 1 room
===
– chair 5 room
===
– cushion 2 room
===
– chair 1 room
===
– cushion 3 room
===
– shelved decisions that were wrong
===
– table for doubting a decision
– table for changing a decision
– room 6 of no chairs
===
– chair 2 room
===
– cushion 5 room
===
– chair 6 room
===
– cushion 4 room
===
– chair 4 room
===
– cushion 6 room
===
– shelved Difficult Art Decision reports of situations solved
===
[floor plan of artwork on wall 6]
– wall 6
– room for Last Minute Decisions
===
[lower, outer left side]
– entrance to the Bureau of Difficult Art Decisions -
![art idea no. 8,582,048 [part 2]](https://gailhastings.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/24.1-art-idea-no-8582048-photo-David-Brandt.jpg)
art idea no. 8,582,048 [part 2]
exhibition invitation sent to regular gallery visitors and
available at the exhibition as a poster/catalogue,
Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin
Encyclopaedia of an Art Idea
When two art authorities conducted a critique on art idea no. 8,582,048, they removed its centre so that through it they could see the position of each other’s argument. The centre was then lost. Some time later, a photograph mysteriously circulated showing the ‘complete’ idea being registered at ‘desk no. 5’. Upon seeing this a Museum included the idea in a survey on Minimal art intended to coincide with the current exhibition, a homage to the constructivist Vavara Stepanova. The authorities therefore searched for the idea’s missing centre and, in so doing, found four possibilities. The question thus arose: which of the four is the missing one? We, a handful of willing viewers, were asked to decide. The decision, however, has not yet been made for ‘viewers’ are not to touch the art and as the idea is in the other room, we can only compare it to the possibilities via memory. This process is laborious and up until this hour [12.09 Uhr] of this day [Mittwoch 18.11.1998] , our memories have failed. Albeit, we do suspect that not one of the four is the ‘original’. Nevertheless we must continue and select one, the best one, quickly — for time is running out and the homage to Stepanova will soon be over.
Page 17
————————
- waiting room at the Bureau Of Art Ideas, Berlin
- library of forgotten ideas
- stairs
- desk no. 5
- filing cabinet of registered art ideas
- d/sided shelf
- chair
- entrance for artists wishing to register their ideas
- entrance for art authorities
-
Untitled discussion no. 4
Chairs part of family room in which gallery installed sculptuation, San Francisco
Encyclopaedia of Missing Art
I was looking at the yellow monochrome below when a square part of it went missing. I asked a passing Art Authority if they had seen the missing part anywhere, and they had, but as an handbag resting on a chair close-by. What sort of qualifications do Art Authorities receive these days? Although the difference between an ‘art’ object and a ‘real life’ object[floor plan]
has now disappeared, surely the difference between the two and three dimensions remains.
For the sake of sanity I did not inspect the chair and so now report that on this day [Tuesday 3-2-98] and at this hour [5:06pm] , a part of the above monochrome continues, albeit regrettably and due to no fault of my own, to be ‘missing’.
~page 3~[floor plan details]
– chairs for leaving handbags on
– counter for registering found handbags
– staff only
– Lost & Found Handbag Department
– storage walls for hanging up lost handbags
===
– desk for the occasional cross-referencing between departments
===
– Incomplete Monochrome Department
– storage walls for hanging monochromes with missing parts
– staff only
– counter for registering incomplete monochromes
– chairs where Art Authorities sometimes sit -
difficult art decisions: walls four and five
Encyclopaedia of Difficult Art Decisions
We were asked by an art authority to install a wall protector on wall 5, to save the wall from being marked by people leaning against it while discussing the artwork on wall 4. We promptly attended to the task, however upon completing it we discovered that the wall protector, in not only being the same colour as the artwork on wall 4, but also made of the same vinyl material, confused the distinction between itself and the artwork. Now we’re not authorities on art, but it seemed obvious to us that this was a matter of great concern, for the general art public might mistakenly connect the art object and the wall protector, as is easy to do, and wastefully attempt to fathom the[floor plan]
meaning of the connection. To avoid this we searched for other protectors and found the last two; however, neither was better that the first, as one was also of the same colour as the artwork, and the other had been patched with a piece of vinyl that was surprisingly a similar size as the artwork, as well as the same colour. We found it impossible to decide just which of the three was least confusing and therefore most suitable, so we filed a ‘Difficult Art Decision’ report in order for an art authority to consider and solve the matter. Meanwhile, the situation has been left as it is — at this time [10:15 am] and on this day [Wednesday, 8.10.97] — until such moment as a final decision is made.
page 45
————
[floor plan details]
– wall 4
– wall 5
– two folded wall protectors
– table for reviewing forgotten decisions
– shelves of filed not too difficult ‘Difficult Art Decision’
– very invisible stairs************
– wall 4
– wall 5
– two folded wall protectors
– table for reviewing mistaken decisions
– shelves of filed ‘Difficult Art Decisions’ too difficult to ever solve
– slightly invisible stairs************
– wall 4
– wall 5
– two folded wall protectors
– table for reviewing invisible decisions
– shelves of filed pretending-to-be-difficult ‘Difficult Art Decisions’ -
art opinion no. 635
Encyclopaedia of an Art Opinion
An authority on art gave me the job, one day, of completing the artwork ‘art opinion no. 635’. All I had to do was line up the chair with one curved corner with the painting with one curved corner found in this room on the adjacent floor plan. ‘Simple’, I’d thought, but simple indeed. Oh I tried, but hopelessly failed. I followed my instructions and took the stairs to this room, but not once in twelve times did they lead me to its entrance. Finally, feeling too fatigued to continue, I completed the following art opinion job report.
ART OPINION JOB REPORT
ART OPINION NO. 635
IN YOUR OPINION, HAS THIS ARTWORK BEEN COMPLETED? YES / NO [circled]
ANY COMMENTS? It was impossible to find the entrance to ‘this room’.
(cont’d) I believe someone has made a mistake with the stairs.
TIME 2:28 pm
AND DATE Wednesday, 8 October 1997Then, after filing it away, a most alarming number of people began to claim that they have been to this room and have seen ‘art opinion no. 635’ completed. ‘Impossible’ replied the Art Authorities ‘our art opinion job reports are never wrong’. Yet no matter the degree of authority invested in my opinion, people have, most oddly enough, continued to disagree.
page 635 -
To make a work of ordered art
Statements, Art Basel, 1997
The watercolour ‘page 1’ is first encountered as a reproduction printed in the exhibition catalogue where it includes four objects — L. I. F. and E — in disarray.
On the other side of the partition, opposite its reproduction, an actual watercolour ‘page 1’ is this time encountered with three of its objects now in order and one left in disarray.
[Catalogue reproduction of watercolour page 1 that includes all four objects: L. I. F. and E.]
Encyclopaedia of Order in Art
To put some order into this work of art and straighten three of the four objects L. I. F. E. in disarray below, simply follow these directions. Hold a pencil above the objects, close your eyes and think of what in your life you feel needs sorting out. Let your hand fall and select an object. Repeat twice. Open your eyes and note the time _______ and date _______ of this ordering. Take the first selected object, _____, and align it with the painting on page 27; the second object, _____, with the plinth; and the third object, _____, with the bookshelf. This leaves object ___ in disarray, a testimony to what is lost. The work of ordered art is now complete.—– page 1 —-
[framed watercolour page 1 that, upon completion, leaves only object I.]
Encyclopaedia of Order in Art
To put some order into this work of art and straighten three of the four objects L. I. F. E. in disarray below, simply follow these directions. Hold a pencil above the objects, close your eyes and think of what in your life you feel needs sorting out. Let your hand fall and select an object. Repeat twice. Open your eyes and note the time 4:29pm and date Monday 27.1.97 of this ordering. Take the first selected object, F. , and align it with the painting on page 27; the second object, E. , with the plinth; and the third object, L. , with the bookshelf. This leaves object I. in disarray, a testimony to what is lost. The work of ordered art is now complete.—– page 1 —-
**********
[The book – The Order of Looking]
THE ORDER OF LOOKING
CHAPTER L.
Published by
the Bureau of Looking
1997
———page 30———THE ORDER OF LOOKING
CHAPTER L.
The Bureau of Looking has recently observed from latest statistics that not every part of a work of art is looked at.
To understand this phenomenon further, the Bureau has devised this book of a continuous red-watercolour line as a means by which to analyse whether any underlying pattern, or order, dictates which parts of the line are looked at and which parts are not.
The Bureau therefore asks for your assistance by limiting — or expanding — the parts of this line that you look at to 27, and to number each part, i.e. page, in the order seen (excluding, however, the pages previous to this one).
———page 32———[following pages]
THE ORDER OF LOOKING
Looked at number: ___________———page […]———
-
To complete a work of contemporary art
Encyclopaedia of patterns in contemporary art
To complete the pattern in this work of contemporary art you must first walk into a room in which there is a blue-cubed cushion on top of a white chair. In this room you will find a pattern of repetitive squares that has a missing part (see asterisk*). There is also in this room a plinth with four[floor plan]
objects labelled T., I., M. & E.. Consider each and select the one, the right one, that best accords with the pattern and place it next to the asterisk. You have now completed the pattern in this work of contemporary art. Please note here the time [6:44pm] and date [25.3.97] .
~page 3131~
[Floor plan details]
– chair
– plinth -
coincidence at 5:58 pm
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF COINCIDENCE
To make this work of coincidental art you must first enter a room in which there is an empty plinth: a. Relax and hang your handbag on the chair. Look at the blue and red oil painting on the wall and be struck by the random arrangement it shares with the surrounding objects, including your handbag. Upon experiencing this coincidence, please
[floor plan]note here the time 5:58 pm and date Sunday, 23.2.97 . This work
of coincidental art is now complete. To appreciate the probability of your handbag, and therefore your presence, taking part in this work of coincidental art, consult page 24. To find the meaning behind this mystery, and in particular its message to you, turn to page 162.———page 48———
[floor plan details]
– blue and red oil painting
– page 48
– chair
– empty plinth: a
– page 24
– page 162———————
[plinth]
empty plinth: a
for missing pages 24 and 162
-
coincidence at 5:57 pm
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF COINCIDENCE
To make this work of coincidental art you must first enter a room in which there is an empty plinth: u. Relax and hang your handbag on the chair. Look at the green and red oil painting on the wall and be struck by the random arrangement it shares with the surrounding objects, including your handbag. Upon experiencing this coincidence, please[floor plan]
note here the time [5.57 pm] and date [Sunday, 23.2.97] . This work of coincidental art is now complete. To appreciate the probability of your handbag, and therefore your presence, taking part in this work of coincidental art, consult page 32. To find the meaning behind this mystery, and in particular its message to you, turn to page 104.
———— page 60 ————
[floor plan details]
– green and red oil painting
– page 60
– empty plinth: u
– chair
– page 32
– page 104
[plinth]
empty plinth: u
for missing pages 32 and 104
-
coincidence at 5:54 pm
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF COINCIDENCE
To make this work of coincidental art you must first enter a room in which there is an empty plinth: r. Relax and hang your handbag on the chair. Look at the black-blue and pink oil painting on the wall and be struck by the random arrangement it shares with the surrounding objects, including your handbag. Upon experiencing this coincidence,[floor plan]
please note here the time [5:54 pm] and date [Sunday, 23:2.97] . This work of coincidental art is now complete. To appreciate the probability of your handbag, and therefore your presence, taking part in this work of coincidental art, consult page 92. To find the meaning behind this mystery, and in particular its message to you, turn to page 170.
———page 120———
[floor plan details]
– black-blue and pink oil painting
– page 120
– empty plinth:r
– chair
– page 92
– page 170[plinth]
empty plinth: r
for missing pages 92 and 170
-
coincidence at 5:51 pm
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF COINCIDENCE
To make this work of coincidental art you must first enter a room in which there is an empty plinth: d. Relax and hang your handbag on the chair. Look at the light and dark green oil painting on the wall and be struck by the random arrangement it shares with the surrounding objects, including your handbag. Upon experiencing this coincidence,[floor plan]
please note here the time [5:51 pm] and date [Sunday, 23.2 97] . This work of coincidental art is now complete. To appreciate the probability of your handbag, and therefore your presence, taking part in this work of coincidental art, consult page 8. To find the meaning behind this mystery, and in particular its message to you, turn to page 174.
——— page 16 ———
[floor plan details]
– light and dark green oil painting
– page 16
– empty plinth d
– chair
– page 8
– page 174————
[plinth]
empty plinth: d
for missing pages 8 and 174
-
To make a work of spontaneous art
Encyclopaedia of Spontaneous Art
To make this work of spontaneous art you must first enter a room in which there is a light blue rectangle with a green outline painted on the wall. In this room there is a chair about to fall. Spontaneously respond by reaching for a part of the rectangle and placing it under the chair. Record your unconstrained impulse on[floor plan]
the ‘table more measuring spontaneous responses’ by asking someone close by the time [7:56 am] and date Monday 24.2.97 . Now return the Encyclopaedia to the ‘shelves for moments met’ beside the entrance. This work of spontaneous art is now complete.
—page 5 —
[floor plan details]
– window
– chair about to fall
– table for measuring spontaneous responses
– shelves for moments met
– shelves for moments missed -
a silent cube
Individually stamped exhibition announcement card that Galerie Köstring/Maier, München
sent through the post to regular gallery visitors
Encyclopaedia of Silent Art
To make this work of silent art you must first enter a room in which there is a telephone. Wait for the telephone to ring, answer it and note the date and time of the ensuing conversation. _______ at _____ am/pm. Wait for a second call and again note the date and time. _______ at _____ am/pm. Now calculate the length of time that passed between these two conversations by making every 60 minutes equal 3 centimetres: ______hrs. _______min. = _______cm
Take out this length of silence from the yellow rectangle above and place it on a white rectangle. You have now completed this work of silent art.
~ page 44 ~
Announcement card:
The Bureau wishes to advise that silence can be saved and turned into substance by following these simple directions. Enter a room in which there is a telephone, wait for it to ring, answer it and note the date and time of the conversation: _______ at _____ am/pm. Now wait again for a second conversation: _______ at _____ am/pm. Calculate the length (substance) of time (silence) that passed between these two conversations by making every 60 minutes equal 3 centimetres: _______min. = _______cm. Results are to be recorded in the ‘Encyclopaedia of Silent Art’ at the room for two corners and a cube. Thank you.
Stamped by the Bureau of Calculating Silence © 1965
————————————————
-
To make a work of timeless art
photo: Christopher Snee
A watercolour page from the Encyclopaedia of Timeless Art is first seen intact on the exhibition announcement card posted to regular gallery visitors prior to the exhibition. The page slips from the vertical plane of 2D to the horizontal plane of 3D.
photo: Alex Davies
Encyclopaedia of Timeless Art
To make a work of timeless art please follow the guidelines below.- Enter a room in which there is a yellow line and pink circle.
- While in this room hold a pen above the blue square below, close your eyes and think of the moment you were last betrayed. With eyes still closed, let your hand fall and mark the page.
- Cut out this ‘moment of betrayal’ into a circle and place it on top of the plinth on page six, the room you are now in.
- To finish this work of timeless art turn to page seven, ask someone close by the time and date and complete this information in the spaces provided.
~ page 5 ~
photo: Alex Davies
Encyclopaedia of Timeless Art
<—— this moment ——> in the room for finding time.~ page 6 ~
Encyclopaedia of Timeless Art
To complete this work of timeless art please ask someone close by the time ________ and date ______.~ page 7 ~
[floor plan details]
Room for Finding Time
– a watercolour depicting this time
– table for taking away the time from time, one colour at a time
– a moment less blue
– chair for remembering this time
– shelf for storing see-through times of forgotten colours
photo: Alex Davies
-
To make a work of thoughtful art
Offset printed card sent through
the post as the exhibition’s announcement card.
Encyclopaedia of Thoughtful Art
To make a work of thoughtful art please follow the guidelines below.- From the square above cut out a thought into a shape and lean it next to number 1.
- From this thought cut out its anger and place it on the plinth at number 2.
- From this anger cut out its love and place it at number 3.
- From this love cut out its understanding and return it to where the thought had first been taken, at number 4.
- Now ask a passer-by the time [21:57] and the date [Freitag.13.10].
——— page ’95 ———
Thanks to Katharina Harms and Christian Bumke for the translation, and to Thomas Taubert for asking a passerby the time and date and add them to the Encyclopaedia to complete the work.
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Drawn Lines
<p><em>Encyclopaedia of drawn lines</em><br /> telephone rang, it was the Bureau of Re-Drawn lines asking whether her line was from choice or circumstance, and whether she wanted it updated: shifted in one direction or another. After<br /> <em>page 25</em></p>
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pages 32, 28, 19, 7, 2 and one
Pages 32, 28, 19, 7, 2 and one is a sculptural situation comprising of a 32 page novel in which only six pages are visible — pages 32, 28, 19, 7, 2 and one.
Page 32: The number 32 is in white on the outside of a dark green hotel room’s door. The door’s left hinge turns the door into a book’s cover one opens to read inside — where the inside, here, is a hotel room. The book’s door is propped open throughout the exhibition.
Inside, the book’s room is undergoing refurbishment. It includes many drafts, doubts, previous lives and histories, aspects to be hidden or underscored, mistakes to be covered over, passages to be cleared, plots to be shaped and conversations that direct its construction. Once complete, the refurbishment will hide much of this. The final novel will have a fresh coat of paint unifying the walls into a single whole that speaks of only one plot. New carpet will cover years of spilt paint blotched allover the aged floorboards in testimony of previous refurbishments.
For the time being, however, the room’s uncoordinated incidences lay bare a writing process in the midst of a final scene’s act under construction.
Page 28: A lone dress hangs in an open wardrobe still being built. Lead pencil outlines the dress’ bold geometric pattern saturated in red and black watercolour. There is no zip or buttons with which to put the dress on or take it off. A part of the pattern is incomplete near the lefthand shoulder. If washed, the dress’ pattern would drain away. The label on the dress reads ‘page 28’.
Page 19: a builder’s construction drawings quickly sketched directly onto the wall to solve a structural problem while remodelling the room, have a rectangular outline that demarcates the boundary of page 19. The construction drawings extend, however, beyond the outlined edge of the page.
Page 7: two indiscriminate blotches on the floor mark the distance in which occurs page 7. The two blotched points are the outcome of unrelated circumstances irreverent of each other except for their unity as a page.
Page 2: Alexander Rodchenko’s photo of Varvara Stepanova found in an art history book, is photocopied on an A4 page and blu-tacked to the wall. Stepanova wears a dress patterned with Stepanova’s own design. The pattern is the same pattern as seen on ‘page 28’ hanging in the wardrobe.
Page one: Instead of a numerical number one, page one is unlike the other page numbers for being spelt out as one. Page one is the one who enters the work. Page one is the one who carries the work’s plot from its opening cover to its end, the one who connects the work’s disparate moments into a coherent whole. When one walks out the room, one carries the book’s ending with them.
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divisions between friends
Catalogue image of petit fours as yet to be consumed by friends
[Text on table]
– place for friend no. 1
– place for friend no. 2
– place for friend no. 3
– place for friend no. 4
– place for friend no. 5[Text on wall]
divisions between friends
where: 1 Hope = 12 Circumstances
1 Ci = 12 Immeasurabilities
1 Im = 12 Deliberations[Text on the five petits fours remaining pastry papers]
– friend 1, for 12/60ths of the time, found the circumstances unbearable.
– friend 2, in 24/60ths of the time, imagined five hopes.
– friend 3, for 36/60ths of the time, looked the other way.
– friend 4, in 48/60ths of the time, summed the 5 figures incorrectly.
– friend 5, for 60/60ths of the time, deliberated over whether to tell a lie.
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Floor plan: Empty, except
offset printed floor plan on A4 sheets of paper
sent through the post as the exhibition’s announcement
with exhibition details on the back
stencilled measurements:
12 inconsequences = 1 thought
3 thoughts = 1 conversation
e.g. 5th 8in (back wall) = 5 thoughts and 8 inconsequences
12 inconsequences = 1 thought
3 thoughts = 1 conversation
e.g. 10c (right wall) = 10 conversations (which equals 30 thoughts or 360 inconsequences)
