'National Treasure' The work developed out of Vociferous Void - a core exhibition from the international artistic research project Topographies of the Obsolete
- Submitting institution
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Buckinghamshire New University
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- 18200
- Type
- L - Artefact
- Location
- 8th Gyeonggi International Ceramic Biennale, 24 April – 31 May 2015, Icheon World Ceramic Centre, Rep. of Korea
- Open access status
- Out of scope for open access requirements
- Month of production
- April
- Year of production
- 2015
- 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
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- Forensic science
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- Criminology
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- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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0
- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
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- Additional information
- This multi-media work introduced new critical insights into aspects of skill displacement following the aftermath of decades of deindustrialisation in North Staffordshire’s ceramic sector. It examines shifts in production from the ‘shop floor’ to the factory tourism model, through an innovative combination of live performance, installation, social practice, film and artefact that ‘bring the traditions of the [ceramics] field into a new category of experience’. Brownsword’s parody of this ‘artisan on display’ format, critiques how the parade of ‘indigenous’ artisanal craft from the visitor-centre experience, obscures the realities of profit first strategies of mass-automation and global outsourcing.
Ex-industry China painters were employed by Brownsword to follow the genre of the romantic ruin commonly depicted in 18th century British ceramics. These intermittent site-specific performances together with their filmic documentation set out to subvert passive spectator consumption. Painting on the backs of discarded platters found at former historic sites of production, with images that documented Stoke-on-Trent’s post-industrial fallout offered a new perspective to social realism within ceramic practice. By incorporating the dynamics of hired labour, National Treasure offered an inventive method to elevate and disseminate the endangered practices of a rapidly disappearing culture of labour. The work also explored the ethical implications of appropriating people and their skill as a raw material – a subject relatively absent in contemporary ceramic practice.
Research underpinning National Treasure has been disseminated via numerous conferences including the International Academy of Ceramics 46th General Assembly, Dublin; explored by international critics/writers including Vieteberg, Dahn and Wiggers; exhibited in Scandanavia and South Korea. As one of 2629 entries by 1470 applicants from 74 countries, a panel of eminent judges ‘unanimously’ awarded National Treasure the Grand Prize at the Gyeonggi International Ceramic Biennale (the most prestigious stage for contemporary ceramics), in recognition for Brownsword’s ‘creativity and contribution to the field’.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
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- English abstract
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