Callout to bring an object to Kandos

Would you like to participate in an artwork in WAYOUT Art Space in Kandos by lending an object you live with and can do without for 6 weeks?

The artwork is WAYOUT_blp, planned as a floor drawing marked out on the wooden floor of Kandos’ WAYOUT Art Space building, using objects from the surrounding geographical area, for the exhibition in May-June 2023, opening 13 May.

The objects stand in for the location you bring them from, and come together as a concentrated blp to demonstrate a communal regard for place.

The project is still a while off, but I am making arrangements for people to deliver their objectsnow, and be stored in WAYOUT until installation begins on 9 May.

If you would like to participate, please write to me at wayoutblp@gmail.com with a description or image of the object you want to lend or donate to WAYOUT_blp, and its regular location, and what arrangements you want to make to get it to WAYOUT.

 

What is a blp? A blp is a commonly found shape made up of an rectangle with a half-circle at the shorter ends, as shown in the WAYOUT plan above. The blp was named and used by artist Richard Artschwager from the 1960s onwards as a generic indicator of the geographic locale ‘here’, where the blp is located (what I mean here by 'place'). See the blp discussed by Artschwager and curator Jenifer Gross on You Tube, and discussed separately by Terry Hayes and myself in our 2022 essays.

WAYOUT_blp is planned to be an artwork made by temporarily drawing the outline of a blp, about a 15m x 5m, on the WAYOUT building floor, and locating the many lent objects within that blp shape so that together the objects mark out the blp for the duration of the exhibition.  In bringing objects from the surrounding geographical area, WAYOUT_blp uses them in conjunction with the role given to the blp by artist Richard Artschwager, to demonstrate a communal regard for place. WAYOUT_blp also uses a found-object-drawing practice of many artists, notably Tony Cragg in the 1980s.

What object should we bring? Bring one object that you normally live with and have a personal connection to (but that is not already an artwork, not likely to be offensive or dangerous, and likely to be moved easily by 1-2 people, ie under 15kg). Objects are best brought to the WAYOUT building in Kandos in the installation week (9-13 May 2023), otherwise please make arrangements for later and earlier deliveries. Earlier and later storage/collection points will be devised as needed. At the end of the exhibition, please collect your object, or let us know if you want your object adopted out. When objects are delivered to WAYOUT or other collection points, they should be wrapped or boxed if they need protection. They should also be accompanied by a completed Lending Agreement in the brochure found here (and also in printed form at WAYOUT).

Collection points: You can bring objects to one of the artist talks in Dubbo, Mudgee, Bathurst, Lithgow and other places. Find collection points in those towns and in Sydney by emailing wayoutblp@gmail.com.

How big is the surrounding geographic area that objects should come from? It will concentrate in Kandos and the Central West but can spread out as far as lenders live.

What do we need to know about the object? When you deliver your object in 2023, you will be asked where the object last resided, your name, address and contact information, what you want to happen to the object afterwards, and to accept that while everything reasonable will be done to protect your object, its safety cannot be guaranteed absolutely. This is all in the Lending Agreement here. It would also be good (but not essential) to have a photo of you with the object (which can get taken when you deliver it or you can email an image on wayoutblp@gmail.com.) It will get posted on social media (eg on the WAYOUT blp page) unless you ask for it to be kept private. It will also become part of the documentation.

PERMANENT RECORD:
• All lenders will be acknowledged as key participants in this project. The on-line record of lenders will include photographs taken of lenders with their objects (when agreed to), or the objects alone, and the information lenders agree to provide (if they also agree this can be kept after completion of the project);
• observational hand-made drawings of each object will record a visual likeness of the object, and because objects need to be shown care and attention in order for their likenesses to be drawn in this way, the drawings will also indirectly record the care and attention lenders show towards the place the objects come from (which is less able to be recorded by visual means). These drawings will be made by artists ranging from highly skilled figurative drawers to artists and people who say they simply like to draw.
• lenders are invited to tell the stories of the objects, recorded in writing or sound recording
• professional photographs of WAYOUT_blp by Alex Wisser;
• map showing where objects come from
• the blp as a type of documentation of the place or site, by being a 'discursive mark' sitting somewhere between text and place.

Why am I making WAYOUT_blp?

To experiment with:

• ways of showing the aliveness of the site used in site-specific art and how to document that;

• collaborating with a community to make an artwork that Has the potential to be a communal demonstration of caring for place and that may contribute to changing the way people in Modern/Western cultures regard place;

• making large floor drawings and with how different drawing practices (floor drawing & observational drawing) could complement each other;

• strengthening connections with the past by engaging past inventions in new artworks (such as the many objects people bring, observational drawing skills, Artschwager's blp, Tony Cragg's object-drawing practice etc);

Find out More

• Come to an artist talk/workshops in early 2023. These will be advertised here as dates are confirmed. RSVP wayoutblp@gmail.com & to be kept informed.

1. Dubbo WAYOUT_blp Workshop, Saturday 11 February 2023, 1-3pm, Meeting Room 4, Western Plains Cultural Centre, Dubbo.

2. Mudgee WAYOUT_blp Workshop, Saturday 11 March 2023, 1-4pm, at Cultural Workshop #1 at Mudgee Art Precinct, Mudgee.

3. Bathurst WAYOUT_blp Workshop (at Bathurst Regional Art Gallery)

4. Lithgow WAYOUT_blp Workshop (at Gang Gang Gallery)

5.

• Or ring me (0425277462) or chat to Leanne Wicks, WAYOUT_blp local manager - at WAYOIUT Art Space in Kandos or on 0488 955 645.

• If you know you would like to participate already, just turn up at WAYOUT in Kandos with your object between 9 and 13 May 2023 (10am and 3pm) (but good to let us know via wayoutblp@gmail.com so we can save spaces. If you are bringing anyone else's object, bring their completed Lending Agreement in this brochure as well.)

• Please also spread the word—ask anyone you know who may become interested—send their email addresses if you think we should remind them. We will follow up in April 2023.

Hoping to hear from you soon

kind regards
Margaret Roberts
0425 277 462

About me: http://margaretroberts.org/archive.html

About WAYOUT: https://cementa.com.au/wayout

 

Wayout_Blp acknowledges Australia's First Nations' People as the Traditional Owners and Custodians of this land, the Dabee people of the Wiradjuri nation where Wayout Artspace is located. We offer our respects to the Elders—past, present and future—and to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.