Restaging the Radical performance Works of John Latham.
This multicomponent output consists of restaged performances, an archived sculpture, an essay and a journal paper. This project centres on a restaging of works John Latham, a pioneer of conceptual and socially engaged art. Commissioned initially by Portikus, part of Frankfurt’s Städelschule art school, White restaged a LathamSkoob Tower performance in 2014 to coincide with God Is Great, an exhibition at the gallery that combined his work with that of the late artist. Neal White Realises a Skoob Tower (2016) was performed at the Henry Moore Institute, Leeds, as part of the exhibition A Lesson in Sculpture with John Latham. Archive in Ashes (2016), a sculptural artefact made from the remains of the performance and referencing Latham’s Still and Chew. See Portfolio Booklet for documentation of research dimensions.
- Submitting institution
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The University of Westminster
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- v4132
- Type
- T - Other
- DOI
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- Location
- God Is Great, John Latham and Neal White Portikus, Städelschule, Frankfurt am Main, May 10 – June 29, 2014; A Lesson in Sculpture with John Latham, Henry Moore Institute, Leeds, March 24 – June 19, 2016. Further details in portfolio.
- Brief description of type
- Other: Multicomponent
- Open access status
- Out of scope for open access requirements
- Month
- May
- Year
- 2014
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
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- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- Latham’s God Is Great consists of a bed of glass and three religious books, the Talmud, Quran and the Bible. During the exhibition the work was attacked and partially vandalised because of its religious references. White’s research investigates how the context of John Latham’s work has changed, and asks whether his ideas relating to event-sculpture are still meaningful in the discourse surrounding conceptual art today. The project highlights that event-structures as performances are central to Latham’s work and re-enactment is a vital part of conveying his ideas today. For those institutions that have avoided restaging of Latham’s work for health and safety reasons, White’s project showed that it is perfectly possible to do so safely. Where they have been held back by political caution, the project demonstrated that public reaction can never be precisely predicted and that we should not be fearful of experimenting. The events opened up a space for understanding Latham’s ideas about knowledge and time and how they might be considered in relation to the institutional practice of collecting, the archive and the display of radical or conceptual artworks. Archive in Ashes was later acquired by the Henry Moore Institute.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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