Hoard: Towards and Archaeology of the Artist's Mind. Norquest Industrial Estate, Leeds. February - December 2012

A group of artists will use the space to hoard objects and artefacts relating to their practice. The process will be documented and made into an online publication at the end of the year.

 

 

Rhizomatic

1st October - 12th November 2010
Departure Gallery, 5 - 6 Boeing Way, The International Trading Estate, London UB2 5LF.

Rhizomatic is an experimental, decentralised curatorial system based on the concept of the Rhizome, as explored in Deleuze and Guattari’s philosophical masterpiece A Thousand Plateaus. This is Departure Gallery’s largest and most ambitious show so far and includes work by over two hundred artists exhibiting in 100,000 sq ft of warehouse space.

Selected artists associated with Departure Gallery were each invited to choose up to six artists to exhibit alongside them. In turn, this second generation were encouraged to invite a further six participants, making a third generation, who could then invite six more. This six-link structure was inspired by the idea that all humans are connected by ‘six degrees of separation’.

A rhizome is a sprawling, unhierarchical system of connections that are constantly in flux and can spring up at any moment in space and time. This exhibition does not seek to fix the rhizome by presenting it in a finished form, but, rather, it represents an attempt to freeze a moment of this rhizomatic process in the interests of examining its structure more closely. Furthermore, the show aims to catch a glimpse of the creative networks within which Departure Gallery’s artists operate, in order to locate ourselves within the wider art world.

"Principles of connection and heterogeneity: at any point a rhizome can be connected to anything other, and must be... A rhizome ceaselessly establishes connections between semiotic chains, organisations of power, and circumstances relevant to the arts, sciences and social struggles." Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus.

This rhizomatic structure has particular resonance in the context of The International Trading Estate, which is a hub of haulage and distribution companies sorting and transporting goods in flux between producer and consumer.
The exhibition will not constitute the end of the rhizome, because a true rhizome has no beginning or end, but is ongoing and unlimited. Each artist involved will continue to make connections during and after the exhibition through the contacts and ideas that emerge as a result of the show. This opens up the possibility of creating a larger sequel exhibition at some point in the future. Who knows where this will go and what might result?

Louise Ashcroft, Curator.

Read interview here

PROP

13th September - 23rd October 2010. Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, London UB2 5LF.

A group show of artists who use objects, images and interventions to suggest narratives or theatrical action.

Stardust Boogie Woogie. 6th – 11th July 2010.

Moninka Bobinska Gallery, 242 Cambridge Heath Road London E2 9DA 

Stardust Boogie Woogie is a sculptural experiment based on concepts of collaboration explored in Surrealist games such as Exquisite Corpse and Parallel Collage.

Louise Ashcroft, curator of Departure Gallery, has invited the collective Charlesworth, Lewandowski & Mann to make a framework structure onto which other artists will build from day to day throughout the exhibition to create a final collaborative artwork. The artists have been nominated by the curator and by five experimental spaces:

Matt Ager representing James Taylor Gallery
Thorbjørn Andersen representing Supplement
Patricia Lennox Boyd and Blue Curry representing The Woodmill
Harry Lawson and Sam Venables representing The Royal Standard
Mark Selby representing Schwartz Gallery

Participating artists will each have one day to add to the sculpture. They must work individually without discussing their ideas and will be encouraged to modify, disrupt and relate directly to each other’s work.

At the end of the week, the completed sculpture will be a microcosm of an art world in which the artists represent different galleries that work parallel to one another but also compete for attention and resources. The idea is to move away from the concept of collaboration as a democratic process of collective decision-making and team-work in order to explore the possibilities of collaboration as a relay of individual authors working separately to make their mark on something shared. Collaboration is thus reinterpreted as an anarchic struggle between different, perhaps contradictory, visions. This method of co-authorship parallels the ways that cultures and histories develop.

As demonstrated by Surrealist games, collaborative systems which unite disparate concepts and styles can have exciting artistic outcomes as well as radical cultural and political implications. These ideas will be explored in a discussion and review of the project, which will be held in the gallery space on Sunday 11th July 3-5pm.

Exhibition Schedule:
06.07 Charlesworth Lewandowski & Mann
07.07 Mark Selby & Matt Ager
08.07 Thorbjørn Andersen
09.07 Patricia Lennox-Boyd & Blue Curry
10.07 Harry Lawson and Sam Venables
10.07 Private View 6 – 9 pm
11.07 Discussion 3 – 5 pm

click here for video

All Systems Go

21st June - 4th July 2010. Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, Southall, London UB2 5LF.

All Systems Go brings together a diverse group of artists who work in relation to physical and conceptual systems, which they have created or adapted as frameworks for artistic experimentation. Patterns, rules, collaborative techniques, interventions, mechanical systems and improvisation provide structured starting points which open up a multitude of possibilities for exciting artistic outcomes.

David Angus, Louise Ashcroft, Aglae Bassens, Nathan Birchenough, Claire Blundell-Jones, Helen Collett and Lois Macdonald, Lawrence Daley, Danielle Drainey, Sandra Erbacher, Rita Evans, Rafael Farias,Doug Jones, Helene Kazan, Jonathan Kipps, Paul Lewthwaite, Jo Lathwood, Ben Lloyd, William Mackrell, Nicola McCartney, Savvas Papasavva, Rob Pugh, Ilona Sagar, Tracy Sarroff, Steve Smith, Jackson Sprague, Andrew Sunderland, Unidentified Art Group: Robert Hunt, James Pepper, Rosanne Robertson, Imogen Welch, Rich White, Sarah Tew, Sam Zealey.

The Middle of Nowhere: Objects and Actions in the Abyss

6th - 10th March 2010. Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, Southall, London UB2 5LF.

Amidst a labyrinth of factories and haulage depots, over 40 artists conquer this cavernous space with ambitious sculpture, video and wall-based work, each offering a different perspective on the idea of ‘the middle of nowhere’, through exploration of themes such as disorientation, transience, camouflage, liminal space, spectrality and non-place.

Artists: Kayde Anobile, Louise Ashcroft, Helen Barff, Gabriel Birch, Justine Blau, Amy Brooks, Eitan Buchalter, Roisin Byrne, Sarah Casey, Ben Cave, Charlesworth Lewandowski & Mann, Richard Cramp, Doris, Danielle Drainey, Everything is Number, Amy Ferguson, Rebecca Gould, Ben Heasman, Andrew Hladky, JooHee Hwang, Doug Jones, Helene Kazan, Jo Lathwood, William Mackrell, Clinton De Menezes, Ilse Mikula, Parlour Collective, Catalina Garces de los Rios, Mark Scott-Wood, Neil C Smith, Joel Somerfield, Andrew Sunderland, Andrea Tyrimos, Jonathan Velardi, Josh Whitaker, Andy Wicks, David Snoo Wilson, Chris Wright.

 

Trident Way 2: The Southall Project

Friday 11th - Friday 18th December 2009. Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, London UB2 5LF

Louise Ashcroft, Helen Barff, Nathan Birchenough, Neela Basu, Doug Burton, Anka Dabrowska, Danielle Drainey, Livia Garcia, Nathalie Guinamard, Elizabeth Hancock, Investigation Three (Lucie Galand, Anna Kontopoulou, Rashmi Munikempanna, Robbie Lockwood), Doug Jones, Helene Kazan, William Mackrell, Gemma Nelson, Savvas Papasavva, Assunta Ruocco, Jeni Snell, Sara Twomey, David Snoo Wilson, Charlotte Young. Curated by Louise Ashcroft.

Trident Way 2: The Southall Project is the sequel to a site-specific residency and exhibition that took place in September and October 2009 where 14 artists were invited to inhabit an empty warehouse in Southall’s busy International Trading Estate and create new work in response to these surroundings.
In this current exhibition, Departure Gallery celebrates its first year of ongoing curatorial experiments, extending the project to a host of new participants, making this its most ambitious exhibition to date. A total of 25 diverse artists will create new or develop existing works during a month long communal residency, culminating in an exhibition from 10 December. These new artists have been carefully selected to either compliment or counteract themes and aesthetics from the original Trident Way exhibition.
Located on a busy trading estate in the heart of Southall’s residential sprawl dubbed ‘Little India’, the football pitch sized (35, 000 sq ft) warehouse offers artists a unique opportunity to experiment with its aesthetic and conceptual possibilities. Each artist will be encouraged to interpret and engage critically with the vast space, creating a range of works in sculpture, painting and multi-media. Themes will include exploring the sculptural qualities of the building to investigating the location’s political history and identity.