Anywhere in the World: David Medalla's London
Curated by Guy Brett.
6-11 September 2005
ICA, London.
David Medalla, Director of London Biennale, will be the subject of a major
exhibition at the ICA - the Institute of Contemporary Art - on the Mall
in London, England. The exhibition, entitled "Anywhere in the World: David
Medalla's London" is being curated by English art critic Guy Brett, who
was recently a Visiting Scholar in Art History at Harvard University. The
exhibition is the fourth in a new series of shows organised by Jens Hoffman,
Director of
Exhibitions at the ICA London, with the ICA Exhibitions team.
The series is entitled "London in Six Easy
Steps: Six Curators, Six Weeks,
Six Perspectives".
David Medalla's exhibition will feature
large-scale prints in
limited editions of a selection of
Medalla's impromptus and performances in
the last forty-five years. The photos were
taken by Guy Brett, Andre
Kertez, Stephen Maria Rother, Giorgio
Spiller, Fritz Stolberg, Leif
Svendsen, Andy Barrett, Adam Nankervis,
Raoul Tenazas, John Dugger, Kai
Hilgemann, Kim Creighton, Manuel Cristaldi,
Enrico Oliviero, GG Cazzavillan,
Michele Herzog, Lovato Guerrino, Charlotte
Moth, Rachael Daniels, Andrew
Forrest, Emil Cadoo, Andree Navarro, Pedro
Uhart, Katie Sollohub, Marko
Stepanov, Arvinder Bawa, Maggie Lambert,
Clay Perry, Peter Emanuel Goldman,
Peter Fillingham, Oriol de Quadras, Mark
Greaves, Antonio Roda, and others.
Three iconic sculptures by
David Medalla will be on show: the
exquisite "Micro -Merz -Bau: in homage to
Kurt Schwitters" (a miniature
study for a large-scale fountain),
originally shown in Brantwood, the home
of John Ruskin, in an exhibition curated by
Jill Rock; the Gold-Glazed
Ceramic Incense Burner, shown early this
year in the WC Gallery of Stephen
Perkins in De Pere, Wisconsin; and the
micro-installation for David
Medalla's Palindromic Play entitled "Tar
Pot Eb Ot Woh" which he presented
with members of the Exploding Galaxy at the
University of Warwick in 1967.
David Medalla's "Bubble Machine"
of 1963 (the first work of
auto-creative art) is illustrated in the
book "Art Since 1900" by Hal
Foster, Rosalind Krauss, Benjamin H. D.
Buchloh and Yve-Alain Bois.
A vitrine in the exhibition will
contain the two books
of the
2002 and 2004 London Biennale events and of Eros-Arrows by London Biennale
Artists, lovingly compiled by Spanish
artist Marisol Cavia.
The exhibition opens on
Tuesday, September 6, 2005, at 6 p.m.,
with a parade of Self-Portrait - Effigies
by London Biennale artists,
starting from the Eros statue on
Piccadilly Circus in central London and
culminating in the lower main gallery of
the
ICA on the Mall.
Inside the gallery, Australian
artist Adam Nankervis (founder &
director of MUSEUM MAN of
Liverpool
and Berlin) will perform "The Midas
Moth" in homage to David Medalla,
co-founder with Nankervis of the MONDRIAN
FAN CLUB. At
7:30 the
same evening, Guy Brett will give a talk on David
Medalla's art in the upper gallery of the
ICA.
Throughout the time-span of the
exhibition several London
Biennale artists will give performances.
These include an afternoon of
poetry readings and songs on
Wednesday,
September 7, 2005, featuring Chris
Burke, Adrian Fisher, Ricardo Gaete, Jon
Gershon, Roberta Kravitz, Luna
Montenegro, Richard Niman, Sarah Reilly, Jill Rock, Ernesto Sarezale, and
Tzuzumi.
On
Thursday,
September 8, 2005, David Medalla will continue
his participatory art propulsion entitled
"Destiny" which he began this
summer on
Brighton
Beach in Sussex, England, during "Long Short Drift"
organised by Katie Sollohub. German artist
Andreas Uhl will do an
intervention, followed at
6:30 p.m.
with a performance entitled "Network" by
Frauke Ehmke, supported by "Detour
Consulting".
On
Friday,
September 9, 2005, throughout the afternoon, three
London-based French artists (Regine
Elliott, Geraldine Gallavardin and Cyril
Lepetit) will give three separate
performances. The occasion will also be
the
London
launch of Cyril Lepetit's book, "Infidelites Respecteuses",
published on the occasion of his solo show
at the Centre Culturelle de
Basse-Normandie in
Caen,
France.
On
Saturday,
September 10, 2005, there will be separate
performances by English artists Jill Rock
and Calum Kerr, Regine Elliott of
France & Mabel Encinas of
Cuba, Saso
Stanojkovik from Macedonia, Felma Barbo
and Mmmmm (Luna Montenegro from Santiago de Chile & Adrian Fisher from
Camberwell, London).
On
Sunday,
September 11, 2005, at three in the afternoon,
Mexican artist Raul Pina will give a
performance, followed by a talk and
slides-show by Gulsen Bal about Sexy Male
Wrestling in her native
Turkey.
The talk will segue into the main event of
the exhibition, which is being
eagerly awaited by the art world in
London: the COSMIC WRESTLING MATCH
between Adam Nankervis (as "The Ghost of
Joseph Beuys") versus David Medalla
(as "The Spirit of Marcel Duchamp aka Rros
Selavy"). The referee for this
metaphorical wrestling match (a unique live
event which will last several
rounds) will be Guy Brett. The Gong Master
will be Marko Stepanov. English
artist James Moores will be the Bets Vetter
aka The Bookie. The viola player
will be Miles Christie. The seconds will be
Dan Bourke, Gordon Johnstone and
Tiago Slewinski. The
ICA in
London was the venue of a live event by Joseph
Beuys, while the founders of the
ICA
(Sir Herbert Read and Roland Penrose)
were personal friends of Marcel Duchamp.
Nankervis and Medalla's Wrestling
Match will be their Double-Homage to those
two Masters of Modern Art.
After the wrestling match,
there will be a Grand Dance of the
Effigies. Among London Biennale artists
living abroad who have sent Effigies
for David Medalla's exhibition are American
artists Reynolds, Raphael
Norman-Tenazas and Nick Kuskin, and
Canadian artists Nancy Petry and Bryan
Mulvihill aka World Tea Master Trolley.
Many London Biennale artists living
in
England
have created a wonderful collection of beautiful Effigies. They
will dance with their Effigies and exchange
Effigies with one another after
tossing them in the air with a hand-held
trampoline made of a red silk cloth
embroidered with celestial dragons.
Filipino artist David Medalla, the
founder and director of the London
Biennale, has shown previously in the ICA
London: in 1973 with American artist John
Dugger, Banner Arts master and
creator of the participatory project
entitled "People Weave A House", and in
1978 with Catalan artist Oriol de Quadras,
when they gave their multi-media
performance entitled "Magellan and the
Circumnavigation of the World".