Studio Jamming: Artists' Collaborations in Scotland

Published On Fri 6 Jun 2014 by Grant Hill

Cooper Gallery at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design (DJCAD) will later this month present a major new exhibition that takes its cue from the live improvised excitement of musical jamming to celebrate collaborative art.

Studio Jamming: Artists' Collaborations in Scotland is part of GENERATION; 25 Years of Contemporary Art in Scotland and the Glasgow 2014 Culture Programme. Adopting a diverse curatorial approach, the project comprises an exhibition, critical writing residency, and a month-long event series. It will culminate on 25th July with a 12-hour Jamming Symposium.

Curator Sophia Hao said, “Studio Jamming is set to research, annotate, contextualise and celebrate artists’ collaboration as a particular phenomenon of artistic practice in Scotland. Developing as a live critical discourse, the Studio Jamming Hub acts as a collaborative site where artists, writers, architects, educators, researchers, curators, cultural thinkers and participants present, reflect upon and elaborate the possibilities and histories embedded in artists’ collaborations.”

Among the highlights of Studio Jamming is the presentation of works from artists’ collaborative groups including Graham Eatough & Graham Fagen, Full Eye, GANGHUT and Henry VIII’s Wives. Between 30th June and 2nd August the collaborative groups will occupy the Studio Jamming Hub for a week each to present new works and events.

The preview, featuring a performance by the collaborative group GANGHUT, takes place from 6-8pm on Thursday, 28th June. The spontaneous, vibrant nature of the creative process will be captured in the Hub, meaning viewers will enjoy a new experience each time they visit.

This is the first discursive survey to foreground the grassroots character of artists’ collaboration that has contributed to the remarkable achievements of contemporary art in Scotland. The key ingredient for this process is the Studio Jamming Hub, an architectural intervention constructed in and around Cooper Gallery designed by Studio Miessen led by Markus Miessen, an alumnus of GSA and now a leading thinker in Critical Spatial Practice who recently developed the exhibition spatial design for Hito Steyerl’s major retrospective at the Van Abbemuseum.

Offering a vital platform for presenting and disseminating critical writing, the Group Critical Writing Residency, edited by Maria Fusco, is inviting emerging writers in Scotland to produce new textual works on collaboration and collectivity. The Residency is marked by a live Group Critical Reading Event in which writers give their work a public voice. Centred on Declarations presented by Artists’ Collaborative Groups from all over Scotland, Studio Jamming culminates in the 12-Hour Jamming Symposium.

Studio Jamming is annotated and collated through (LIVE) publishing, a series of free publications created, printed and disseminated in situ. This will be edited by artists and graduates of DJCAD Sean Scott and Katie Reid and produced with the (LIVE) publishing team.

12-Hour Jamming Symposium, 25 July 2014, 11am – 11pm:

Studio Jamming culminates in a rousing 12-Hour Jamming Symposium. Staged in the Studio Jamming Hub at Cooper Gallery on Friday 25 July, the Jamming Symposium will forge a vital platform for discursive interrogations and speculations upon the phenomena of collaboration and the ideas, artworks and writings constituting Studio Jamming.

Centred on declarations from Artists’ Collaborative Groups from across Scotland, the event will feature keynote talks by international and national leading thinkers whose practices invest collaboration with depth and rigour. The 12 hours will be jammed with gigs, performances, screenings and Group Critical Readings, providing an auditorium for the multiple voices that are the spirit of contemporary art and culture in Scotland.

Keynote speakers include Stine Hebert, Maria Lind, Francis McKee and Markus Miessen. The Declarations from Artists’ Collaborative Groups will be introduced by David Harding and a panel discussion will be chaired by Dominic Paterson.

More information is available at http://www.dundee.ac.uk/djcad/exhibitions/exhibitions/studio-jamming/.

For media enquiries contact:

Grant Hill
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University of Dundee
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