Wednesday 19 June 2013

Symposium


On Friday 21st June Artists from the Frank Bobbins Institute will be presenting at the Symposium organised by graduating students from Sheffield Hallam University (click here for more details) 
Frank Bobbins have been busy recording a special message for those attending the symposium, as a personal appearance is not possible on that day.


1 comment:

  1. A distinct presence was made by the FBI at the symposium. It was an edgy and unpredictable performance between two other presentations that depicted rather more structured ways of doing things. They talked bringing artists together, with more coherent ideas about how dialogue and collaboration can help to bring about an event or feature, or to develop a body of work. Also, about making studio and exhibition spaces available to be able to bring in new people, constantly, for fresh opportunities for dialogue. Very good, it looks like they've all done a lot of stuff and had a lot of fun, but because of the corporate and Arts Council funding it's more like a safe, sane, community centre for artists.

    I'm not really sure what Frank Bonnins is, but don't think that 'sane' nor 'safe' come within a hundred yards.

    The presentation went down well, Rosie's unrehearsed and deadpan delivery in the face of Jess' sometimes rambling, sometimes explosive interruptions, was enjoyed by the audience. It matched up well with the video interview with Frank Bobbins that was shown afterwards.

    In the Q&A there was a lot of questions framed around the FBI, even some questions that started out asking about each of the presentations ended up being about Frank Bobbins. There didn't need to be any questions from the audience at first, as all the other speakers had plenty of things they wanted to express themselves, about Frank Bobbins. Jess and Rosie were both well engaged, handling the discussion really well.

    I think some of the key points people found they liked about FBI were the free and unrestrained spirit of it and how this was given by the 'mascot' of Frank Bobbins, and how each of the artists seemed to still be very much independent whilst inviting collaboration to take place under the FBI umbrella, rather than coming together specifically for the purposes of 'converging' and then by implication 'diverging' as those projects are completed.

    In the end, Rosie had some good points to make about how the association with Frank Bobbins can be seen as a licence to be absurd and daring to develop new ideas, and Jess reminded us that humour and absurdity are human experiences that can be double-edged.

    Even the guy who's presentation was about curating a series of (probably) boring lectures in order to enable 'convergence', admired Frank Bobbins with nearly every speaking breath he had during the discussion.

    Good job, well represented.

    ReplyDelete