Author Archives: SummerhallTV

Polish Contemporary Art Organisation : Waves

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Polish Contemporary Art Organisation present their first annual group exhibition ‘WAVES’, showcasing artists from Poland and of Polish descent at different stages in their practice, working in various mediums – photography, written word, painting, installation, collage and film.

Waves is a metaphor for the constant movement and influx of Polish talent to the British shores, connected to the latest wave of migration which started in 2004 when Poland joined the EU. Over the centuries the UK has experienced an inflow of Central European creativity, greatly contributing to the cultural landscape of the UK.

Whether inherited through blood bonds or freshly from the Fatherland the most vibrant, new wave of contemporary Polish talent is being showcased in the PCAO exhibition in the hope of making waves in the Western art world.

Artists taking part in ‘Waves’:
Martyna Benedyka
Jakub Ceglarz
Nadège Druzkowski
Tashi Gore
Joanna Lubońska
Karolina Szpyrko

Polish Contemporary Art Organisation
7 – 27 November, 2016
11:00–18:00
‘Waves’ is part of Summerhall’s 2015 Associate Exhibition Programme.

Rachael Thomas : What We Call Love: From Surrealism to Now

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Featuring modern and contemporary masterworks from the world’s leading collections by ABRAMOVIĆ, BRANCUSI, DALÍ, DUCHAMP, ERNST, GIACOMETTI, OPPENHEIM, PICASSO, WARHOL, YOKO ONO, and many more. What We Call Love is accompanied by an exciting programme of screenings, talks, events and live happenings, listed below.

What We Call Love explores how the notion of love has evolved within the 20th century. How have seismic sociological changes concerning sexuality, marriage and intimacy, alongside developments in gender issues, affected the way we conceive love today? How does visual art, from Surrealism to the present day, deal with love and what can these artistic representations tell us about what love means in our contemporary culture?

Drawing on contemporary sociology, neuroscience and of course art, What We Call Love sheds some light on these questions. While we cannot give a final definition of “what is love” we can examine how artists have represented it. Presented in three chapters, the exhibition draws on Surrealism’s idea of love as “amour fou” (crazy love), new visions of love which emerged after the 60’s and the often problematic concerns of contemporary love.

For more detail go to imma.ie/en/page_236945.htm

12 September 2015 – 7 February 2016 at IMMA

Marie Brett : E.gress

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E.gress is a filmic artwork that maps a world of loss and change, exploring how individuals diagnosed with dementia find new ways to adjust to changing world. This multi-layered film, a portrait of living moments on life’s edge, invites us to contemplate loss, love and life itself.

The artwork was produced by artist Marie Brett and musician Kevin O’Shanahan following an intensive collaboration with the Alzheimer Society of Ireland, informed by the concept of absence and presence and how ambiguous loss theory relates to an experience of dementia.

Irish Museum of Modern Art until 13th December

Rob Doyle : Here Are the Young Men

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Here Are the Young Men depicts life for four young men on the savage streets of Dublin.
Rob Doyle was born in Dublin, and holds a first-class honours degree in Philosophy and an MPhil in Psychoanalysis from Trinity College Dublin. For the past several years he has lived in Asia, South America, the US, Sicily, and London, and he currently lives in Paris.

Doyle turns his attention back to Ireland, and his hometown of Dublin, in his debut novel, Here Are the Young Men. Matthew, Rez, Cocker and Kearney face the void of their post-school lives, and spend their first summer of freedom in a savage apprenticeship on the streets of Dublin. Roaming aimlessly through the city, fuelled by drugs and dark fantasies, the teenagers spiral into self-destruction, fleeing a reality they despise.

Here Are the Young Men brilliantly captures the anxieties and the fears of teenage years and is an ambitious portrait of a jilted generation. Fellow Irish novelist John Boyne, author of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, described the book as ‘a powerful, passionate and electrifying novel’.

Gavin Francis : Adventures in Human Being

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Frances Hider interviews Gavin Francis about his latest book in another video from our Edinburgh International Book Festival author interview series.

Edinburgh GP Gavin Francis spent over a year at a remote research station to write the Scottish Book of the Year-winning Empire Antarctica, but now he’s looking inwards for Adventures in Human Being. While we live with our own bodies, few of us really know what’s actually going on inside. Francis reflects on the surprising variety of ways the body has been imagined and portrayed over the centuries.

Eamonn Farrell : Charles Haughey: power, politics & public image

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This new exhibition of photographs by Eamonn Farrell at the Gallery of Photography, Temple Bar examines the public image of Charles Haughey – the most controversial politician since the foundation of the state. With his Napoleonic manner, driving ambition and extravagant private life, Haughey remains a compelling and divisive figure in the Irish political landscape. As a Taoiseach, he was before his time in understanding the power of the image: he knew how to use photographers to his advantage, and made himself easily available to them. Eamonn Farrell has used this access to capture images that offer real insights into Haughey’s elevated perception of himself.

The exhibition shows ‘Haughey the statesman’ in the grandiose splendor of his mansion. In gesture and body language, we can observe the fawning deference paid him by his political cronies, and the sheer adoration in which he was held by the party faithful. Included also are images depicting the passionate anger he aroused in many outside the party fold.

The exhibition is a chance to observe Haughey and a cast of supporting characters including Brian Lenihan, Padraig Flynn, Mary O’Rourke, Bertie Ahern and PJ Mara at work in their native political habitats ­– Ard Fheiseanna, press conferences, and fundraising dinners. The frame also widens to include the role of journalists, broadcasters and photographers such as Geraldine Kennedy, Gerard O’Reagan, Brian Farrell, Derek Speirs, while the eagle-eyed will also spot a young Richard Boyd Barrett among the protesters. The exhibition sheds light on the often chaotic interplay between the party political machine and the media. This vexed relationship is explored in-depth in a sustained sequence of photographs from ‘The Heave’ of 7th Feb 1983 – when Haughey surprised everyone by surviving yet another challenge to his leadership.

Neither hatchet-job nor hagiography, the exhibition aims to provide the context for a contemporary re-assessment of Haughey, and his political and artistic legacy. It is fitting that this exhibition takes place in Temple Bar. Along with tax exemption for artists, Temple Bar Cultural Quarter is one of Haughey’s major contributions to the arts in Ireland.

Thursday 29 October – Sunday 22 November 2015

More information

Sarah Grainger-Jones: 183 More Sleeps

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The Koestler Scotland Exhibition, Selected by artist Ruth Ewan
7 – 29 November, 2015, 11:00 –18:00

183 More Sleeps is an exhibition of artwork from prisons, secure hospitals, secure children’s homes, immigration detention centres and community justice services in Scotland. Selected by artist Ruth Ewan from entries to the 2015 Koestler Awards – a charitable scheme which has been rewarding artistic achievement in the penal and secure sectors for over 50 years.

The exhibition features an extensive range of artwork including painting, sculpture, needlecraft, nail art, printmaking, woodcraft, audio, animation and writing.
Supported by the National Lottery through Creative Scotland, with additional support from the Robertson Trust and the Souter Charitable Trust.

For further information – email info@koestlertrust.org.uk or call 020 8740 0333
Summerhall Associate Exhibitions Programme

Olmo Blanco : Instalodecoracion

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Interview Room 11 Gallery and Summerhall have joined together to present an intervention by durational mark-maker Olmo Blanco. His drawings add to what is already there – walls, floors and common objects. Blanco does not mask but honors what has gone before, exploring transformation and the evolving functions of early 20th century buildings such as Summerhall. This is a permanent artwork outside the ground floor lift.

Olmo Blanco was born in Boiro (A Coruña, Spain) in 1982. He studied Fine Arts at the Universidad de Salamanca. He has exhibited extensively in Spain at XXXI Bienal de Pontevedra (2010), the INJUVE Prize (2011 La Tabacalera, Madrid), I Bienal de Montevideo (2012) and Veraneante (Museo Marco 2013).

Interview Room 11 Gallery was founded in 2013, it is an artist run gallery and project space located in the centre of Edinburgh. They are dedicated to collaborating with artists and organisations to bring exciting new art to Edinburgh audiences, and to support the existing artist community.

Category: Summerhall Curated

Crawford Art Gallery : The Language of Dreams

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An exhibition of works of art influenced by dreams and the unconscious

Encompassing strands of artistic expression ranging from early twentieth century Symbolism, to late twentieth century Photo-Realism, The Language of Dreams explores aspects of Irish art often overlooked in conventional art history, where exterior reality is less important than an interior world of vivid and surreal imagery, based on the imagination. Among the artists represented are Patrick Hennessy—whose centenary takes place in 2015—Colin Middleton, Nevill Johnson, Hilda Roberts, Brian Boydell, Thurloe Conolly, Gerard Dillon, Ralph Cusack, Cecil Ffrench Salkeld and Mary Swanzy.

Works by Giorgio de Chirico and Salvador Dali represent the European context of Surrealism. However, the main emphasis are the works of art created in Ireland in the decade from 1935 onwards, when the rise of Fascism prompted an artistic response from those working within an “anti-establishment” creative framework. The exhibition will be accompanied by a full colour pamphlet exploring the history of the artists featured and how their inter-personal relationships spurred the development of artistic movements in Ireland.

October 2 2015 – February 6 2016

crawfordartgallery.ie

Malcolm Cruickshank and Paul Diamond : Ekphrasis

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Ekphrasis is commonly recognized as the mechanism for producing a prosaic description of a work of art. The artists, Malcolm Cruickshank and Paul Diamond, interpret this as an interchangeable concept, making art from a vividly described written text.

Cruickshank and Diamondhave taken the trilogy “Anna and Mr God” by Fynn (Sidney Hopkins) as a seminal text. They have explored themes emerging from the books of human connection, understanding, faith, science, mathematics and the idea of discovery through making and doing.

The artists have chosen the historic Demonstration Room at Summerhall as the setting for their work as they see the space as an arena of meeting, perfectly designed to concentrate one’s attention to a single spot. They attempt to reverse the audience’s position by displaying in areas where the viewers would normally find themselves.
Paul’s work and Malcolm’s is extremely varied and different from the other’s. They describe their work as “Juxtaposed but complimentary”.

Which was to be proved

Which was to be done

Which was to be found

Q.E.D

Q.E.F

Q.E.I

Associate Exhibition, Summerhall 6th-12th November 2015

James Mullighan : Cork Film Festival

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Ireland’s oldest film festival and Cork’s flagship cultural happening, the Cork Film Festival lights up and delights the Rebel City in November. In 2015 the Festival celebrates its 60th Edition, taking place 6-15 November.

Its log line is ‘Films. Music. Ideas’. As well as playing a rich selection of the best of contemporary world cinema, it has a lively and varied music on film programme, and a timely event series which uses films to explore some of the burning issues of our time.

The Festival operates out of the Cork Opera House, the Triskel Christchurch, and the Gate Cinema. In 2014 there were 242 films screened – including 93 features (24 Irish) from 51 countries. Competition includes awards for features, shorts and documentaries, with prizes totalling €7,500.

www.corkfilmfest.org

Rob D’Eath : Duality of Function

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Galway Arts Centre presents DUALITY OF FUNCTION curated by Kate Howard & Rob D’Eath, featuring the work of Piet Stockmans (BEL), Alicja Patanowska (POL/GBR) and Isobel Egan (IRL).

DUALITY OF FUNCTION features the work of three artists whose practices explore aspects of one of the most iconic production materials in world history, porcelain clay or ‘white gold’. Their practices are a continuation of the investigation into ways in which clay can help to inform our preconceptions and challenge our prejudices. This exhibition asks questions of the fundamental nature of function. Duality is, perhaps, too small a word for it.

Renowned Flemish designer and ceramist Piet Stockmans has worked with porcelain since the mid – 1960’s, breaking away from clichés often associated with the material, by defunctionalising tableware and moving into installation.Stockmans presents Shrinkage his most recent work in porcelain. He steps back in the production and influences the normal and purposeful process. Based on an existing mould, Stockmans manipulates and even interrupts the conventional production process, so that a new, unique object is created: an object that is placed back in or next to the original mould. Born and educated in Ireland, Isobel Egan is one of Ireland’s most exciting artists working in clay. Egan constructs delicate porcelain minuscule environments, exploring issues of fragility, personal space and memory. Central to Polish artist Alicja Patanowska practice is her allegiance to craft traditions and the making process. Channelling an extensive knowledge of ceramic and glass work, the artist frequently draws inspiration from observations of human behaviour and everyday life, to develop projects which straddle the fields of craft, contemporary design and socially engaged practice. Patanowska’s use of new technologies and modern fabrication methods resists connotations with mass-production; rather, her priority is to find ways of retaining the ‘hand-made’ in the objects she creates.

Since Marcel Duchamp exhibited his ceramic urinal Fountain in an art exhibition in 1917 the territories of art and design have expanded exponentially. The question people always ask about a ceramic object is “What is it for?” We know what Fountain is for but do we accept that it is also functions as a work of art? 98 years on some of us are still not sure!

09 – 31 October

David Haslam : Project Notes

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Will the full support of the Talbot Rice curatorial and technical team, as well as the opportunity to explore the resources of the University of Edinburgh, David Haslam has the opportunity to develop his practice into new and innovative areas.

TRG3 is focussed on supporting emerging artists to develop innovative and experimental projects that both complement and challenge Talbot Rice Gallery’s core programme. Each year at least one graduate from Edinburgh College of Art will be selected to take part.

Find our more about TRG3 at trg3.co.uk

Jessica Lloyd-Jones : At the Edge of Light and Darkness

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Jessica Lloyd-Jones who exhibited at Summerhall during the Science Festival last year now has a new exhibition on at the Leitrim Sculpture Centre. But you don’t have to go all the way to Ireland to see it, just tune in to our video. In association with www.artinireland.tv.

Jessica Lloyd-Jones is a visual artist based in North Wales, with a First Class Honours degree in Fine Art and MFA in Sculpture from Edinburgh College of Art in 2007.

Merging art, science and technology, Lloyd-Jones investigates concepts of energy and natural phenomena through the experimental use of materials and creation of light based sculpture and installations. Working across a range of media, she explores the boundaries between science fiction and science fact to reveal new perspectives on the world in which we live.

Rhona Byrne : Bolthole

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Artist Rhona Byrne’s hand-made objects, installations and collaborative, event‐based, projects explore the interactions between people and their habitat. Bolthole invites visitors to construct and reconstruct the installation to make their own environments. The spaces can be individual shelters/dens or a large configuration of pieces to make one large space. Participants construct and inhabit an ever-changing moving installation.

VISUAL Carlow BOLTHOLE
03 October – 10 January 2016

Oliver Braid : The one where we wonder what Friends did

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Artist Oliver Braid presents: The one where we wonder what Friends did – A sculptural installation at Hanson Street project space, Glasgow.

Oliver Braid lived in Glasgow between 2008 and 2015. During and since graduating from the Master of Fine Art at Glasgow School of Art in 2010 Oliver’s studio work has been led by attempts to answer a question first posed by Quentin Crisp in 1981; how, if at all, an object may express its maker?

Opposed to tackling the Quentin question directly, Oliver is committed to oblique approaches in order to generate new angles of understanding. Since 2012, Oliver has been considering the query from a perspective known to the artist as The Certainty of Insignificance, which extolls the imperative of ‘existential exuberance’ regardless of attention from others.

As a project, his new sculpture, which will be presented at the Hanson Street Project Space was inspired by the roles played by relationships in late 20th century culture, the collaborative and curatorial practices across early 21st century culture, distortion and medieval mereological thought.

As an object the sculpture was developed with two questions in mind; What is the use of artistic embroidery atop philosophical carpentry? And what is the object that is the relationship between use and not-use?

Event Details:

Venue: Hanson Street Project Space, 77 Hanson Street, Glasgow, G31 2HF.
Exhibition Continues: Saturday 26th September – Saturday 7th November 2015, 10am – 5pm
Family Workshop: Saw-Your-Child-in-Half, Saturday 3rd October, 12noon – 4pm (duration 4 hours). All family groups with children aged between 7-12 years welcome. No need to book.

More information: waspsstudios.org.uk/news-events/one-where-we-wonder-what-friends-did-exhibition-oliver-braid
cargocollective.com/oliverbraid

Rhona Byrne : Huddle tests

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The installation, including sculpture, drawing and wearables, reflects on the desires and tensions experienced between private thought and public behaviour, feelings of isolation and belonging, connectivity and relating, distraction and attending and the fragile state between comfort and discomfort. Rhona Byrne will present her new project, ‘Huddlewear’, a series of wearable artworks/ social clothing developed by the artist during an artists residency at Facebook HQ Dublin.

For this exhibition, Huddlewear becomes a tool for activating exchanges in relationships between individuals, groups and communities. The exhibition invites and encourages visitors to wear and inhabit Huddlewear and to explore the intimacy and complexities of connection in real time. The interconnected designs of the garments can be worn by pairs and groups and aim to explore the wearer’s sense of self and vulnerability during moments of interaction and gathering. By inviting participation and reflection the ‘Huddle tests’ exhibition will involve a series of events and activities as well as an open invite for ‘group work’ for the duration of the exhibition.

Rhona Byrne lives and works in Dublin, Ireland. Rhona makes sculptural objects and spatial environments combining sculpture, performance and processes of participation that explore a negotiation of object, place and social practice. Recent selected projects and exhibitions include, Facebook Air program, Dublin; On that Note, Heart of Glass, Liverpool; Uillinn, Skibbereen, Moving Thresholds, National Gallery of Ireland; Verksmi∂jan, Hjalteyri, Iceland; Cowper Care home, Dublin; Its All up in the Air, Norfolk and Norwich Arts Festival, Uk; Bolthole, Open Studio, Tate Modern and Tate Britain, IMMA
rhonabyrne.com and templebargallery.com

Olmo Blanco : Instalodecoracion

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Interview Room 11 Gallery and Summerhall have joined together to present an intervention by durational mark-maker Olmo Blanco. His drawings add to what is already there – walls, floors and common objects. Blanco does not mask but honors what has gone before, exploring transformation and the evolving functions of early 20th century buildings such as Summerhall.
This is a permanent artwork outside the ground floor lift.

Olmo Blanco was born in Boiro (A Coruña, Spain) in 1982. He studied Fine Arts at the Universidad de Salamanca. He has exhibited extensively in Spain at XXXI Bienal de Pontevedra (2010), the INJUVE Prize (2011 La Tabacalera, Madrid), I Bienal de Montevideo (2012) and Veraneante (Museo Marco 2013).

Interview Room 11 Gallery was founded in 2013, it is an artist run gallery and project space located in the centre of Edinburgh. They are dedicated to collaborating with artists and organisations to bring exciting new art to Edinburgh audiences, and to support the existing artist community.

Category: Summerhall Curated

Scottish Mental Health Festival: Out of Sight/Out of Mind

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A unique and powerful multi-media exhibition featuring work by artists, both professional and amateur, with experience of mental health issues. Works include projection, sculpture, painting and photography. Part of the Scottish Mental Health Arts and Film Festival, this exhibition aims to challenge perceptions and get people talking about mental health.

10 – 31 October 2015. Part of the Summerhall Associate Exhibitions Programme. 

 

Lucy Elvis and Marcel Badia : Alternate Route

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“In the story politicians, intellectuals and artists are standing at a bus stop without realising that it is in fact, the final stop.” – Francis Fukuyama

What if, as Fukuyama stated in his 1992 book, The End of History and The Last Man, we are at the very last stop? Having travelled past many possible destinations, movements and political ideologies, not only may we have come to the end of history, we might have been languishing in cyclical boredom, perceiving a comma where in actuality lies a full stop?

in/Form Art Collective has created an interactive installation which uses Fukuyama’s analogy in direct response to the research and issues presented by 126 FOOTFALL: Articulating the Value of Artist-Led Organisations. As the fifth and final installment of the Primary Resource project, Alternate Route seeks to facilitate an interstice; a reflective space, a gap or break in something generally continuous, in order to reassess from where exactly it is we wish to depart and where it is we wish to arrive.

126 Artist-Run Gallery, Galway City

Beyond Borders : WOMEN AT WAR

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The Peshmerga are Iraqi Kurdistan’s military forces. Unit 70, based in Sulaimaniyah, has a detachment of female Peshmerga who train to be combat ready and in theory may face ISIS on the frontline. The unit also performs an important political and social role, standing for the relatively progressive thinking that many Kurds pride themselves on.

The exhibition is presented by Beyond Borders Scotland, a not-for profit organisation, dedicated to facilitating dialogue and international cultural exchange. Beyond Borders works through several mediums – literature, arts, film, politics and dialogue – to harness Scotland’s unique heritage to provide a platform to cultural leaders from around the world to exchange experiences, in an effort to promote understanding and help reduce conflict. It seeks to facilitate rather than prescribe its cultural output.

21 August – 31 October 2015 11:00-18:00 at Summerhall

Culturefox : ArtsIreland IV

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ArtsIreland is a new series of short videos made with performers, artists and authors across Ireland for the new Arts Council Ireland Culturefox TV. This feature is a compilation of arts-news clips reporting on current events from culturefox.ie and Art in Ireland TV. We also feature short arts news clips made in the north of Ireland as these become available.

Culturefox : ArtsIreland III

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ArtsIreland is a new series of short videos made with performers, artists and authors across Ireland for the new Arts Council Ireland Culturefox TV. This feature is a compilation of arts-news clips reporting on current events from culturefox.ie and Art in Ireland TV. We also feature short arts news clips made in the north of Ireland as these become available.

Michael Rosen : Every Day is a School Day

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Bestselling author and former Children’s Laureate Michael Rosen is issuing a passionate plea to parents, families and children: to look beyond the school gates to see and learn about the world afresh. From understanding politics and religion to enjoying poetry and practical jokes, Rosen offers engaging ways to calm anxious parents and inspire bored children.

Jessica Lloyd-Jones : At the Edge of Light and Darkness

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Jessica Lloyd-Jones is a visual artist based in North Wales, with a First Class Honours degree in Fine Art and MFA in Sculpture from Edinburgh College of Art in 2007.

Merging art, science and technology, Lloyd-Jones investigates concepts of energy and natural phenomena through the experimental use of materials and creation of light based sculpture and installations. Working across a range of media, she explores the boundaries between science fiction and science fact to reveal new perspectives on the world in which we live.

Leitrim Sculpture Centre

Caroline Criado-Perez : Do it Like a Woman

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Ricky Brown talks to Caroline Criado-Perez at the Edinburgh Book Festival about her book ‘Do it Like a Woman: … And Change the World’.

Winner of the Liberty Human Rights Campaigner of the Year award, Caroline Criado-Perez is well known as a champion of international feminism. In Do It Like a Woman she celebrates the heroic acts of women across the world, from the first woman to cross the Antarctic alone, to the members of Russian band Pussy Riot who dared to stand up to Putin. Today she presents her necessary manifesto for women everywhere.

Beyond Borders : A Mile in their Shoes

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This installation by the artist Siemon Scamell-Katz was produced by The Knitting Circle and Beyond Borders Scotland in response to the capture and persecution of Yazidi girls and women by ISIS/Daesh.

Inspired by photographs taken by Falah Shakarm of the girl’s shoes when they first arrived in refugee camps, the installation uses experience, film and dance to tell stories and explore our relationship to another culture’s abuse and genocide. In forcing the visitor to confront the taboo of walking on others’ shoes, the artist considers how our shoes express our individual identities.

Chests of drawers, icons of familiarity and comfort, display a pair of shoes worn by one of the escapees from ISIS/Daesh. Taken from their conservative community, a religious minority, and used and sold as sex slaves, each pair of shoes is accompanied by the wearer’s testimony.

Working with the choreographer/performer Claudia Erixon, Scamell-Katz has made films exploring themes including Capture, Home, Suicide and Conformity. These are accompanied by text by Brian Brivati from The Knitting Circle. Another film of a Yazidi wedding has music composed by Martin Scheureggerr.

Brochures accompanying the installation are available at the bookshop and all donations made by means of the installation will go to a refuge day centre in Northern Iraq, set up by WADI. Donations can also be made online.

In 1991 at the age of 24, Scamell-Katz set up a design business. The business, ID Magasin, then started to create completely new research techniques to study human behaviour, including filming, eye tracking, virtual reality and neuroscience. In 2010, Siemon left to concentrate on working as a visual artist and uses film and painting as part of his practice, adapting learnings about human behaviour to his work.

The Knitting Circle is a collective of volunteers raising awareness of genocide related issues through art and building capacity for peace. Beyond Borders Scotland is an initiative dedicated to fostering peace and greater understanding between peoples, small nations and different cultures from around the world.
twitter.com/knitting_o #jindashoes

Summerhall Associate Exhibitions Programme, 1 September – 31 October 2015 11:00–18:00

Glyn Thompson : A Lady’s Not A Gent’s

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Who did the Urinal? Not Duchamp! say Glyn Thompson and Julian Spalding in their Summerhall Festival exhibition titled ‘A Lady’s Not A Gent’s’.

Thompson and Spalding claim the submission of the urinal (aka ‘Fountain’) to the Independents exhibition of 1917 was made by poet/artist Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven. This was a gesture aimed personally at Duchamp and politically at America for entering the WW1 against Germany in 1917. But ‘Duchamp’s urinal’ has for many become a seminal work contributing to the less critical or analytical forms of Conceptual Art as the source of Don Judd’s tautology of ‘what the artist calls art, is art’. Thompson attributes the ‘readymade’ and the assertion of everyday less-traditionally aesthetic objects as art to Breton’s ambition to include Duchamp within Dada.

This exhibition at Summerhall finds Spalding and Thompson on a roll, with a lengthy exchange with Sir Nicholas Serota published this month in The Jackdaw (www.jackdaw.co.uk) building up a body of evidence that not only was the ownership of a Urinal copy (purchased by the Tate for £500,000) wrongly attributed but that Elsa’s conceit in submitting it to the Independents in 1917 has been entirely misunderstood.

The exhibition It is currently located in the long corridor at Summerhall.