50 Umbrellas
12/05/05
Screenprints, umbrellas and me.
for the show Dynamo (interim show), Space 44, Hackney Wick, London, May 2005
50 umbrellas given away during rain was screenprinted on newsprint with dark blue poster
paint. Enough copies were made so that if they were steadily taken away throughout the
show, they could still be maintained as a sheaf of copies. Each had a pair of hand-cut holes
roughly the size of a two-pence coin at the top. They hung on two sturdy steel hooks fixed
in the wall just above eye level. Situated between a pair of large windows with a broad view
of the sky, the phrase induced an attitude of waiting in the onlooker. Searching the sky for a
hint of cloud, or recalling forecasts, they imagined being rescued from the rain. Despite the
sheets being barely discernable from the white brick of the walls, they exerted a certain
authority hanging sedately at the head of the room.
Calendrical and duplicated in form, the
piece proposed the removal of sheets. If it had been raining, anyone who entered the show
would have seen me standing outside, holding an open umbrella above my head, with
several closed umbrellas under my arm handing them to anyone passing by without one.
Then, upon seeing the screenprints inside, they would approach them as a receipt of the
actions outside. During good weather the screenprinted sheets were ambiguous were they
a record of an action happening elsewhere or propositional? The map for the show
indicated that the space outside the main door contained something (not evident) related
to the screenprints. The lack of activity on that site during good weather inferred it was a
space of potential.
Dynamo Space 44 Hackney Wick London 12-15th May 2005
Click here to view the interim MA show website