WEDNESDAY 1 JUNE, 3.30PM, LECTURE THEATRE 2, DARWIN BUILDING

TERMS OF USE
PAULA LE DIEU, MARYSIA LEWANDOWSKA, CHRIS THORPE, SARAH TEASLEY

A panel discussion focusing on the distribution and ownership of knowledge in contemporary art and design practice. In a time of relentless cultural privatisation, how have online technologies and open culture initiatives challenged ownership? Is it possible, and necessary, for ideas and creativity to become truly public?

RESOURCES

Download pre-reader
Free Culture, L Lessig
The Future of Ideas, L. Lessig
A Hacker Manifesto, M. Wark

LINKS

Tate Channel
Open Source Video
Constant Association of Art and Media
Open Music Archive
Lawrence Lessig: Re-examining the remix
Whither the dream of the universal library?
Creative Commons
Libre Graphics

WEDNESDAY 11 MAY, 2PM
PERFORMING ARTS LAB, STEVENS BUILDING

SO MUCH FOR OPPOSITION

NINA POWER, NEVILLE BRODY, MARK FISHER, BARRY CURTIS


This discussion is centred on potential resistance manifesting in contemporary society in response to the experience of a deep social, cultural, political, financial and educational crisis. Opposition and resistance have arguably been unable to find sufficient voice or traction against a political and economic elite determined to restore order upon the wreckage of past mistakes.

It is in this context that we hope this discussion will explore the current state of political opposition and its relationship to communication and artistic practice.

RESOURCES

Download Pre-reader

LINKS

A Sudden Trembling Recalled Dimly

THURSDAY 5TH MAY, 2.30PM
PERFORMING ARTS LAB, STEVENS BUILDING

PRVIATE KNOWLEDGE TO PUBLIC SERVICE
DAVID REINFURT WITH SARA DE BONDT
AND ADRIAN SHAUGHNESSY

This week we are joined by designer and editor David Reinfurt, who will be discussing the recent conception of "The Serving Library", his new undertaking with Stuart Bailey and Angie Keefer. The 'Serving Library' sees a shift in the practice for Reinfurt, from the more self-contained Dot Dot Dot and Dexter Sinister toward a more open and philanthropic operation of collective production and publishing.

At a time when traditional models for libraries and other physical mechanisms of exchange are under increasing pressure from digital developments and financial constraints, the Serving Library raises potential re-configuration rather than abandonment, embracing both physical and digital potential. The Serving Library itself states that its aim is to collectively develop "a new model for this old institution."

David Reinfurt will be joined by Adrian Shaughnessey and Sara De Bondt in conversation.

RESOURCES

Download Pre-Reader

LINKS

The Serving Library

The Skype connection to the Yes Men in New York failed during the discussion, this is the subsequent interview conducted with Mike
Bonanno of the Yes Men.

Listen to the original discussion here

WEDNESDAY 6 APRIL, 2.30PM
HOCKNEY GALLERY, STEVENS BUILDING

FICTION IN PRODUCTION
JAMIE SHOVLIN, STEVE BEARD, CHRISTOPHER WILSON & THE YES MEN

The collapsing distinction between what is real and what is invented, between fact and fiction and truth and untruth in contemporary and popular culture is having profound effects on the transference and communication of knowledge and information. Artists throughout history have manipulated and used fiction as a method of production and exchange as a way of challenging the viewer’s preconceptions of the everyday. However today, notions of ‘truth’ in a public sense are an increasingly complex idea, with staged reality television and fictional celebrity commodities permeating every facet of popular culture. Whilst the wider public is increasingly demanding 'truth' and 'reality', there is a general acceptance that these truths are often anything but. It is in this context that this discussion seeks to explore the use of fiction within artistic and communicative production.

RESOURCES

Download pre-reader

LINKS

Ryszard Kapuściński

THURSDAY 31 MARCH, 2.30PM
PERFORMING ARTS LAB, STEVENS BUILDING

EXPERIENCE DESIGN AND THE FUTURE OF EVERYTHING ELSE
RONALD JONES, ALEX COLES, DAVID BLAMEY
MONIKA PARRINDER

I haven’t met Ronald Jones, but I’m familiar with some of his articles for Frieze. They’re good reading. The one on how he sees designers adopting the strategies of Conceptual art titled ‘Are You Experienced?’ draws together the distant worlds of high art and theme restaurants with the neat dexterity of a magician. Voila! How come no one thought of that before? The additional texts that he’s recommended for our discussion provoke further ideas. For instance, hasn’t the concept of cultural production in experiential terms been around for some time already? I mean, isn’t the Sistine Chapel ‘experience design’? What about an Ecstasy tablet or Picabia’s 1921 painting L’Oeil Cacodylate – where the artist held a party and had his guests doodle on a blank canvas? Could it be that over the years our understanding of art and design in social context has become so familiar that we have forgotten to recognize it for what it is? [...]
Maybe I’m being unnecessarily paranoid, but the move to patent experience scenarios has sinister parallels with pharmaceutical companies who are already exploiting the intellectual property of indigenous peoples in the development of new drugs. What do you think?

RESOURCES

Pre-reading material

LINKS

Are You Experienced?, Ronald Jones
Fail Again Fail Better, Ronald Jones
Welcome to the Experience Economy

WEDNESDAY 16 MARCH, 2.30PM, PERFORMING ARTS LAB, STEVENS BUILDING

CURATING IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN
M ICHAELA CRIMMIN, EMILY PETHICK
& EMMA SMITH

‘Public’ space in the UK has been eroded by fear (to what degree paranoia?) about crime and terrorism (are we not now the most surveilled – most filmed - population in the Western world?), and by business (witness the advertising now permitted on Trafalgar Square). Art too is frequently chosen by consensus and by criteria that is about place making and ‘community’ participation, to fit with the political drive towards localism and civic duty. But do we want art as signposting, or do we want art as challenging discourse? Do we want more risk? Do we want to see a clear difference between art and design or the blurring of disciplines? And who should be making the decisions on behalf of all of us?

RESOURCES

Pre-reading material

POST-DISCUSSION INTERVIEW
(MP3 download)
Conducted by Ajay Hothi