GRESHAM WOODEN HORSE
A longitudinal socially engaged art project in a neighbourhood
2016 - 2022
Practice-led research focused on the process of a socially engaged art project co-produced with residents and stakeholders of Gresham, a neighbourhood in central Middlesbrough.
CONCEPTUAL
FRAMEWORK
"SOCIALLY ENGAGED ART FUNCTIONS BY ATTACHING ITSELF TO SUBJECTS AND PROBLEMS THAT NORMALLY BELONG TO OTHER DISCIPLINES, MOVING THEM TEMPORARILY INTO A SPACE OF AMBIGUITY. IT IS THIS SNATCHING AWAY OF SUBJECTS INTO THE REALM OF ART-MAKING THAT BRINGS NEW INSIGHTS TO A PARTICULAR PROBLEM OR CONDITION AND IN TURN MAKES IT VISIBLE TO OTHER DISCIPLINES."
Pablo Helguera
"EPISTEMOLOGIES OF THE SOUTH CONCERN THE PRODUCTION AND VALIDATION OF KNOWLEDGES ANCHORED IN THE EXPERIENCE OF RESISTANCE OF ALL THOSE SOCIAL GROUPS THAT HAVE SYSTEMATICALLY SUFFERED INJUSTICE, OPPRESSION, AND DESTRUCTION CAUSED BY CAPITALISM, COLONIALISM AND PATRIARCHY."
Boaventura de Sousa Santos
"PLACE, IN OTHER WORDS DOES - AS MANY ARGUE - CHANGE US, NOT THROUGH SOME VISCERAL BELONGING BUT THROUGH THE PRACTICING OF PLACE, THE NEGOTIATION OF INTERSECTING TRAJECTORIES, PLACE AS AN ARENA WHERE NEGOTIATION IS FORCED UPON US."
Doreen Massey
+ What are the roles and processes of an artist, the artwork, and its context in Gresham, a central neighbourhood in Middlesbrough?
+ What are the challenges and tensions of practice-based research situated within multiple institutional and social-economic contexts underpinned by the constituent fields of relations?
+ How can a migrant, woman, artist, researcher begin to delink the practice/research from an extractivist endeavour?
Project co-commissioned by Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art and Counterpoints Arts. Supported by Arts Council England and Thirteen Community Fund.
by Isabel Lima, 2022
in Art, Migration and the Production of Radical Citizenship, edited by Agnes Czajka and Áine O’Brien. London: Rowman & Littlefield.
RECENT
EXHIBITION
GRESHAM WOODEN HORSE
Newcastle Contemporary Art Gallery
2022
by Áine O’Brien, 2022