SYMPOSIUM: PIDGIN LANGUAGE: ANIMALS, BIRDS AND US
Saturday 10th October 2009 (10.30am – 4 pm)Kings Lynn Arts Centre
‘Pidgin language occurs when worlds collide.’ (Ron Broglio, 2008)
Lecture Programme Coordinator: Helen Bullard
This symposium is in conjunction with my solo show Animus flux at Kings Lynn Arts Centre (26th Sept – 31st Oct) investigating bird/animal/human communication.
TICKETS NOW £25 (CONCESSIONS £15) - includes tea coffee and a light lunch
To book your place: 01553 764864 / 01553 779095
Online bookings: http://www.kingslynnarts.co.uk/content.php?TSID=22011
SPEAKERS AND PAPER TITLES:
• RIKKE HANSEN: 'Finding the Animal Voice'
Writer, broadcaster and art critic, currently writing a PhD entitled 'The Sublime Animal'
• ANDREA ROE: 'Attempting Bird Intimacy Through Art and Taxidermy'
Artist examining human and animal biology, behaviour and communication
• ROSEMARIE McGOLDRICK: 'Interviews with Cranes'
Organiser of 'The Animal Gaze' symposium and exhibition 2008, artist and senior lecturer at Sir John Cass, London Metropolitan University
• STEVE BAKER: 'How do we speak about art about animals?'
Author of 'The Postmodern Animal' and 'Picturing the Beast: Animals, Identity and Representation'
• PROF. NICKY CLAYTON: 'Intelligence on the Wing'
Professor of Comparative Cognition at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Clare College
Chair/Discussant: GIOVANNI ALOI - Editor in Chief of Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture
ABSTRACTS and BIOS:
STEVE BAKER: 'How do we speak about art about animals?'
"De l'animal peut-on parler?," Jacques Derrida famously asked in relation to philosophy's tendency to overlook animals, and to have little idea how to speak about their relation to humans in meaningful terms. The art of the past few decades has re-engaged with animal imagery and ideas about animals in more serious, more adventurous and more contentious ways than ever before, but there is little agreement about how that art can or should be discussed and assessed - especially in those cases where the art incorporates actual animals, living or dead. This talk will touch on the variety of clashing voices that often circle such examples of contemporary art, but part of its focus will also be on Baker's own 2009 series Norfolk Roadkill, Mainly - a flawed attempt to figure out the questions it's relevant to ask about such work by trying to make it instead of trying to speak about it.
BIOGRAPHICAL STATEMENT:
Steve Baker is Emeritus Professor of Art History at the University of Central Lancashire , but now lives and works in Norwich. He has been closely associated with the international development of the field of 'animal studies' in the arts, humanities and social sciences since the 1990s, and his books include The Postmodern Animal, Picturing the Beast, and, with the Animal Studies Group, Killing Animals. His research on attitudes to animals in art, philosophy and popular culture draws on interviews and correspondence with contemporary artists in many countries, and he is currently working on a book for Minnesota UP's 'Posthumanities' series called Art Before Ethics: Animal Life in Artists’ Hands. Work from his 2009 series Norfolk Roadkill, Mainly is included in the small group exhibition What's So Odd About Meat? currently showing in Minneapolis.
ANDREA ROE: 'Attempting Bird Intimacy through Art and Taxidermy'
For several years I have been making artworks using taxidermy in combination with technological parts to produce a believable experience of a living creature. In my experimentation with animated taxidermy the resulting effect is often uncanny, mimicking in a mechanistic way the sophisticated systems that give an animal life and individuality. Through these attempts to create a copy of an animal (with the knowledge that it is very likely to fail in re-making and regenerating life) it feels possible that a greater knowledge and understanding might be gained of the complex and sophisticated systems involved in sustaining a living creature.
Most recently, inspired by the books Birds as Individuals and Living with Birds by Len Howard and The Peregrine by J.A Baker I attempt to create visual methodologies for exploring the relationship between human and bird. In my presentation I will show examples of my artworks, film of the taxidermy process and works inspired by museum research collections.
BIOGRAPHICAL STATEMENT:
Andrea Roe's work examines the nature of human and animal biology, behaviour and communication and is designed to awaken experiences of wonder in nature, science and folklore. Art residencies have included The Wellcome Trust, The Crichton Psychiatric Hospital and the National Museums of Scotland. Andrea studied Sculpture at Edinburgh and Fine Art at Chelsea School of Art. She currently works as a volunteer in the taxidermy department at the National Museums of Scotland and teaches part time in Sculpture at Edinburgh College of Art. andrearoe@hotmail.com
PROFESSOR NICOLA CLAYTON: 'Intelligence on the Wing'
The last twenty years has seen a major revolution in our understanding of animal intelligence, namely the ability to think, reason and solve novel problems. It has been known for many years that monkeys and apes share some of these abilities with us, and the common assumption was that intelligence evolved once in our primate ancestors. Recent studies on bird behaviour challenge this assumption, however, by demonstrating that that these abilities are also present within some of our more distant, feathered relatives, the crows and parrots. Such research has changed our view of the bird brain, and consequently how we view our place and theirs in society. Furthermore it raises intriguing questions about how the avian mind relates to the human mind, and vice versa, and how one should treat and inspire the other.
BIOGRAPHICAL STATEMENT:
Nicky Clayton is Professor of Comparative Cognition at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Clare College. Nicky has always been fascinated by birds – by their glamour and elegance, their movements and their melodies. Her current studies focus on members of the crow family, including jackdaws, rooks and jays, challenging common-held assumptions that only humans can plan for the future and reminisce about the past. Her work has led to a radical re-evaluation of animal cognition and the evolution of cognition.
Nicky is also a dancer, specialising in tango and salsa. Her latest project has been to combine her love of birds, her knowledge of science and her passion for dance in a collaborative project with Rambert Dance Company in the production a of new piece, The Comedy of Change, inspired by the life and works of Charles Darwin.
ROSEMARIE McGOLDRICK: 'Interviews with Cranes'
A presentation about the artist’s recent work, which thrives on the processes by which artist and viewer perceive the critter, rather than focussing on the critter itself.
There is a language which serves both acts of art-looking and critter-watching. My concern has been to make this visual, using any medium and, sometimes, hybrid media, too. I have never seen a crane, except at a zoo - a place of critter cages which in my seniority I now avoid. I am not sure that I would go out of my way now to see a crane, despite wishing to see one, as the Japanese origami model seems to stand in quite well for my purposes. My dialogue with this uncertainty – the human desire to see the other animal as it is, vis à vis our persistently intentional modelling of the other animal - is at the heart of my practice.
BIOGRAPHICAL STATEMENT:
Rosemarie McGoldrick is a London-based artist who has shown at the Plymouth City Museum, the Centre for Contemporary Art & the Natural World, the Chisenhale Gallery, the Nigel Greenwood Gallery, the Museum of Installation and Day for Night in Deptford (funded by the Henry Moore Foundation) and at the E. Averoff Galley (Greece). Her commissions include sculptures for Futureworld at Milton Keynes, the London Docklands Development Corporation at Royal Victoria Docks, the Homerton Hospital (Public Arts Development Trust) and for the Chiltern Sculpture Trust in August 2006 in Oxfordshire (Arts Council & Southern Arts).
Rosemarie McGoldrick studied at Hornsey, Chelsea (BA) and Goldsmiths (MA) and is also a Senior Lecturer and Course Organiser for BA Fine Art at the Sir John Cass, London Metropolitan University in Whitechapel. She organised the 2008 symposium and exhibition ‘The Animal Gaze’ at Sir John Cass and recently gave a paper ‘Curator: Carer or Keeper’ at the 2009 Minding Animals conference in Newcastle, Australia.
****FULL ABSTRACT LIST TO FOLLOW SHORTLY****