PULP
Lille, 2009 / 2018
Pulp (a working title) is the culmination of a twenty year project. I never intended it to be so but I have acquired enough material over that period to begin finishing it (and twenty is a good number, a generation, suggestive of change). Pulp is a collection of gallery flyers, literature and related ephemera taken from galleries in the U.K, Europe, Russia and North America which I decided to pulp and remake into new work.
I first had the idea some eighteen years ago. At the time, I imagined the finished work(s) as single pieces the scale of which would be determined by the amount of material so that Manchester would be the biggest (as it is my hometown and therefore I have visited its galleries more than any other) and Berlin, Moscow or Rekjavik, the smallest. I imagined the Manchester piece to be comparable to a Modernist painting in its scale and Berlin, for example, to be perhaps just A4. I thought of the work as a kind of cultural map and imagined displaying them on a gallery wall according to their relative geographical positions with all others (Chicago, Paris, Lille, Dusseldorf, Prague, Moscow...) around and between. I thought the bigger pieces (from the UK) would suggest a kind of cultural dominance (this was also post Britart). This amused me as Manchester is in no way culturally dominant. I considered, however, that to make such large pieces on that scale would probably require the services of an industrial paper mill and inevitably cost tens of thousands of pounds.
Mixture of source material- Ancona,Liverpool, London, Manchester, Nottingham
I then considered the possibility of making them into smaller, built-up pieces reminiscent of Anselm Kiefer's paintings or magazines that had been left out in the rain, its pages stuck together and fanned out exposing, in parts, layers of fonts, colour and fragments of text.
I also considered them as sculptures- the dimensions of flyers in their length and width but their height determined by the quantity of pulp and reminiscent of gallery plinths.
And I thought about remaking them into flyers and placing them back in their original locations (with or without the endorsement of the gallery's curator).
THE PROCESS
It wasn't until 2018 that I began to prepare and pulp some of the material. While tearing the paper, I realised (and remembered) that the quality of the flyers during a certain period (2005-2008) was much better in terms of paper quality, finish and the number of colours used. This was obviously due to better funding and I began to see the work as a kind of graph reflecting cultural and political change (pre and post austerity). I considered the possibility of making the work into a volume of books (twenty in total, their size determined by the quantity and quality of the paper therein, their covers being the dominant colour of that particular year in totum- a spectral graph. I imagined the piece as an interactive sculpture- the books displayed on a large shelf from which they could be removed and replaced (perhaps in the wrong order).
Torn paper- Manchester, Sheffield, Margate, Chicago, Urbino
I researched paper makers in the UK (of which there are very few) and found Alison Newman at Pulp Paper, Glasgow. I subsequently spent four days working with Alison during which time we produced four hundred pieces between A4 and A2 in size.
I became convinced of the validity of the idea of making the work into books when I fabricated the work and was able to see the difference in the 'front' and 'back' of each piece. I felt that there was no front or back- both sides were of equal value as their appearance is a product of the process (and the movement of my hands through the water as I collected the pulp with the deckle). I did not compose the elements within the 'pictures'- I allowed them to settle where the water left them.
They existed as whole pieces; the 'back' equivalent to the 'front'- more like sculptures than paintings or drawings. Therefore, it was necessary for a viewer to see both sides.
Here are some examples of the pieces I made in Glasgow.
Some of this work was featured in an article in Kolaj magazine https://kolajmagazine.com/content/content/articles/pulp-culture/
and in Entitle, a publication produced for The Great Exhibition of the North at Baltic, Gateshead.
http://www.entitlemagazine.com/ArtistSteveHunt.html
Having started the M.A at Salford, I was able to make work on a larger scale. With paper technician, Sue Debney, I was able to produce two large pieces (approximately 1.3 x 1.8 m) in one day using all the material (Manchester, 2007 and Manchester, 2016) respectively.
Below is a video showing the process.
And one of the finished pieces.
All the material from one place, one year in one single piece. Manchester, 2016. Salford, 2020
I'm also interested in the idea of presenting the work in different ways and even remaking it. The idea of 'versions' or series intrigues me- it is an approach I have used with some of my writing and earlier work. I like the idea of there not being a definitive piece- an original or of changing the ‘original’, retitling it, subverting its original meaning or message. At Salford, I have been able to make some big pieces for the first time. Perhaps, I will, after all revert to my original idea? The content and intention remains the same- that the material and quantity thereof determines the size of the work.
Lockdown
So,I find myself in 'lock down'. Since 13/03/2020 (Friday the 13th)when I made the two large pieces, I have been unable to access the university workshop. I do not yet know when I will be able to and under what conditions, but it looks like it certainly won't be until late September.
I have considered the idea of working with the accompanying text from the original material (I have duplicate copies of some fliers. Others, are available on the internet in gallery archives. When I considered making the work into books, I thought about making an index of words made up of artists' names, titles of works and exhibitions, cultural references from the exhibition texts, art terms and names of philosophers, critics and theorists referenced therein, deconstructing them as the original paper material has been deconstructed and remaking (or rematerialising *) them, forming a new text one which, could still reflect its origins (in place and time).
I considered too, the possibility of just making this up from memory or imagination (sometimes memories get mixed up and particularly over almost two decades). Since the archive is one of my personal interactions with the galleries, I felt this was valid and indeed in the act of creating, one has artistic licence- it is, after all, MY work.
One day I made a new text using my phone, texting myself, writing from memory or re-imagining a particular era (the mid 2000s), thinking about Castlefield Gallery in Manchester (the centre of cultural life in the city then for most Manchester based artists and the gallery that exhibited most of their work or, at least, a certain number of those who had studied at the Manchester Art School (MMU as it was known then) and were therefore connected or had formed a network. I wanted to see if it would work and how it would look on the page.
* See The Dematerialisation of the Art Object, Lucy Lippard 'that art might be entering a phase of pure intellectualism, the result of which could be the complete disappearance of the traditional art object. The piece grew out of, and helped contextualize, the preceding decade or so of wildly inventive conceptual art, which often left behind only ephemeral, non-archival relics, or no relics at all other than perhaps recordings of experiences.'
https://www.ideelart.com/magazine/dematerialization-of-art
Looking at my work from this Lippardian perspective, Pulp is a rematerialisation of the often fetishised ephemera (in that fliers have become collectable and are, to the collector, evidence that he was there) and elevated to a status similar to the art itself, often as a replacement for the original (unaffordale) thing- the art itself or where a photograph of a particular artwork is central to the flier, actually equal to the original- a reproduction that can be posted on ones bedroom wall (or, in the case of the more mature and wealthy visitor, framed and hung on the living room wall). Indeed, this is partly why galleries spent so much on the design of the fliers themselves (particularly during that pre-austerity period when art funding was good) and paid respected art writers, theorists etc to pen the accompanying texts (often at the suggestion of the exhibiting artist) it's all part of the branding- presenting a concept of the exhibition and the gallery to its potential audience and peers as that of contemporary cultural relevance or 'coolness' and importance. In the age of 'Mechanical Reproduction', the fliers became the relics. Indeed, particularly in the case of exhibitions of conceptual art where the art was ephemeral and non-archival, the fliers are the only evidence. In fact, since all exhibitions are temporary and works are installed and uninstalled and arranged or curated,in a particular way, the fliers represent to the public, at least, (since the curator would usually have their own personal archive of photographs or video representing their presentation of how the exhibition should be navigated) the only archive. They are, however, merely a visual prompt since all these exhibitions now exist only in memory.
The pulp books are an archive but one that is indecipherable or cryptic. Archive suggests authority, fact, truth but it is a personal archive, my truth.
Authority- author- archive - archivist.
(The Author/Archivist/Artist)
I have just found my original imagined index written on my mobile phone. While scrolling through the text messages, sent to myself, I found other notes I made to myself about my practice and my attitude to making work. Under the current circumstances, these notes are more pertinent than ever.
Here are some examples of my invented, re-imagined, re-remembered index.
A.
Anthropology
Apocalypse
Apocalypto (Gibson, Mel)
B.
Bacon, Francis Bacon, Francis
Barthes Beckett Big
Big Brother (1948, Orwell, George)
Big Brother (Endemol)
Big Brother (Celebrity, Endemol)
C.
Cage
Can
Carthesian
Celebrity
Chiaroscuro
Cinema vérité
Cocaine
Coolidge, Calvin
Coppola (Sofia)
Cost analysis
Cuba
Cube, Gallery
Cube, White
Cubist
Cuboid
Cupola
Curative
Curator
Curatorial
Cyan
Dada
Dadaist
Dance Macabre
Dandy
Dante's Inferno
Death
Deep Throat
Digital
Doppelgänger
Double
Drawing
Duchamp
Dusseldorf
Duty (Call of)
E.
E
Easel
Ecstacy
Eden (East of)
Einstein
Eisenstein
Empire
Empirical
Empiricist
Entomology
Epstein (Jacob) Epstein (Brian)
EQ
Esche
Escher
Etymology
Etymological
Evidence based
Evident
Evel (Knievel)
Evil
Evil (Axis of)
Evil (Resident)
Evolution
Evolutionary
Existence
Existential
Existenz
F.
Fail (again, fail better)
Fall, The
Fan
Fante
Fatal, Attraction
Fatalistic
Fax
FBI,
Fear, The,
Fear, Cape
Fellatio
Fellini
Feminist
Fetish
Fever, Jungle
Film
Flaneur, The
Flaubert
Flesh, Warhol, Andy
Flood
Flux
Fluxus
Fly, The
Frankfurt School, The
Frankenstein
Freedom, (Braveheart, Gibson, Mel (see Apocalypto))
Freedom (Fries)
And more...
A. Abstract Acconci Action(ism) Adorno Aesop Affectation Agfa A-ha Aids (AIDS) AJ (Architect's Journal) AK-47 Al Qaeda Amityville Horror Anti-art Ao (Japanese) AOL Apocalypto Aq (Fuck you Turkish) Aquinas Aquarius (Age of) Art Arts Council Ascoli Asshole Aspect Asti Atari Auteur Available Aversion Awe (Shock and) Axiom Axel (Rose) (Foley) Ayn (Rand) Azure B. Baal Bach Bad Bagism Baghdad Bake-off BAME Band-Aid Battles Bauhaus Bayeux BB King Bee Beuys BFI BGM Bhopal BIG (Notorious) Bjork Black Bloomberg BMW Boogie Nights BP Bquant Brand Brown (Jackie) BS Johnson Bukowski Bwoi C.
B.Blake, William, Blake, Peter, Sir, Fury, The Douglas Kirk, Fury, Fist of, Lee, Bruce, Fury, Fire and, Trump, South Korea, Fury, Sound of, signifying nothing, Macbeth, Shakespeare Gandalph, Lord of the Rings, Gandolfini, James, Gap, The, Gas, Prendergast, formerly known as, Gazza, Gascoigne, Paul, Gecko, Goethe, Gordon, Gordon, Douglas, Gordon, Flash, Gordon, (is a moron), Gorgon, Latin. Gorgos, Gr. Gorgo, terrible Gorgon, The, Hammer, Gorky, Grant, (Arts Council), Grant, Barry, Brookside, Redmond, Phil Grant, Cary (North by Northwest, Hitchcock, Alfred), Gray, Alasdair (writer, post-modern), Green, Grey, Greyworld, Grit, True (Coen Brothers), Grit, True (Wayne, John), Gropius, Walther, Bauhaus, Group, Ashington, Northumberland, Group, Eastbourne, Group, East London, Group, The Peterloo, Grunewald, Gucci, G39, Cardiff, H.
Re-reading these, I see some value in them though I'm not sure of their accuracy (in terms of a specific period). I think they can only work in the context of a book and in relation to the pulp pages- the pictures so to speak.
I considered using the assistive technology software, Read and Write installed on my new computer to scan the fliers and then manipulate the text. This would be a much quicker and more efficient process than typing it myself but, unfortunately my new computer broke down a week after I received it and I am currently waiting for a replacement. experiment with in the future. Perhaps, I might bend and fold the fliers before scanning to see what the scanner detects.
I did something similar with my phone using Google Lens seeing what the app picked up from photographs taken on my smartphone.
Another option would be to find text on gallery websites then copy and paste before editing but not all galleries publish the exhibition texts.
These are all methods, I can explore in time. However, what I really want to be doing is making the paper.
Notes to self made on mobile phone
Scan pulp pieces, print as flyers (relative to their original dimensions, format) according to year, make multiple copies and place/show in original (respective) galleries.
Scan pulp pieces Make paper like the paper used by the galleries concerned (castlefield etc- same type, size, weight- see GF Smith) Print on that paper Fold accordingly Distribute within those galleries.
And so to the 'pictures', the works... I cannot make them... because I have no access to the workshop. I do not wish to make other work during this period- it feels like a compromise and I cannot compromise.. I will not compromise. Here are some notes I made in relation to my practice, my attitude to my practice and the studio environment.
Often, I like artists more than I like their work. I like the way those artists talk about their work. I was reading a statement by Dean Hughes in which he says that 'It's important that the works have a relationship to my hand'. https://www.saatchigallery.com/artists/dean_hughes.htm
It reminded me of my relationship with my work when I work in a studio and am able to be engaged with the materials- the materiality of the work- the touch, the feel, the process of physically making. That is something I rarely experience because I don't have a studio, I have been making work mostly on my phone or computer so I feel kind of internalised. I need a physical space, a discursive environment and time. Time may be the most important thing- real time- two years.
That is why I chose to do a two year M.A and one of the reasons I chose Salford was for its Paper making facilities. There are only three universities in the country that do paper making.
It has been three years since I went to Pulp Paper in Glasgow and began my project (the culmination of almost twenty years of collecting). It's been nine months since I started at Salford University, three months of which have been spent in lock down with no access to facilities. I have waited a long time to make this work - I guess I'll have to wait a little longer.
‘The most important thing in the world and the most expensive thing in the world is time. The only way you can get time is to buy it and in order to buy it, if you’re rewarded for spending your time putting things out, you take that money and you buy time and you make more things. It’s win win, ok?’
Lawrence Weiner
And with this, I draw this blog to a close.