Talks
Inclinations #16: Can Artists Suspend their Conversion of Experience into Capital?
26 November 2014
7:30PM
Convened by: Patricia Reed
Participants: Michael Eddy
Location
Or Gallery Berlin
Or Gallery Berlin is pleased to present Michael Eddy in Can Artists Suspend their Conversion of Experience into Capital? moderated by Fotini Lazaridou-Hatzigoga, for our speaker series Inclinations, hosted by Patricia Reed.
In recent economic analyses of artworks, we often end up with the feeling that we have missed something crucial and yet hard to grasp with descriptions of labour, commodities and market forces. This talk is an artist’s inquiry into the contradictions involved in such theories when we begin to investigate the source points for artistic production, from the viewpoint of “experience”—a fraught and sometimes vague term, but central to discourses on art practice since the beginning of the 20th century.
Following the presentation of this text, we will shift to a lively discussion.
This text will be published in an upcoming monograph by the Montréal-based artist Jon Knowles.
Inclinations:
A monthly speaker series at Or Gallery Berlin, hosting philosophers, artists, curators, and…
The presentation of work revolves around the posing of a question that is the thrust of a guest’s activities. It goes without saying that questions may not be answered, but are grappled with in their unresolvability. An inclination is the force of attraction to a question (without a straightforward response), yet also to each other, as a community who partakes in a common quest(ion).
Hosted by Patricia Reed.
# Arriving at a question is already a departure.
# Questions are a declaration of departure.
# Arriving at a question in thought or activity is also the creation of a trajectory, of inclining oneself towards an unknown goal, yet not without direction.
# A question inclines a departure in a particular way, but a question itself is generic – it propels all modes of seeking some thing. Questions possess the force of bending and swerving ideas/action.
# A question is the confrontation and departure from a lack. To arrive at a question is to arrive at a gap in knowledge, action and speech – a gap that cannot be immediately filled in without the inclination towards something other.
# A question is indisciplinary; the inclining magnetism of a question knows no disciplinary bounds.
In Kooperation mit der Botschaft von Kanada/In collaboration with the Embassy of Canada
Participant Bios
Michael Eddy
Michael Eddy is an artist and writer. His work has been exhibited and published internationally. With a base in photography, he works across various disciplines and media including performance, drawing, writing and installation. His interests lie in rhetoric and decision-making, and in questions relating to experience and value.
Michael frequently works in collaboration with others, the most long term of which is the collaborative trio Knowles Eddy Knowles. From 2010–2013 he was co-organizer of the artist-run space HomeShop in Beijing. Michael studied at NSCAD in Canada and at the Staedelschule in Germany.