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Manchester Metropolitan University
By: Rosanne Robertson
Fine Art (painting) is a very open course with encouragement and facilities to enable great development into various mediums. Studio space is varied with some very good spaces available.
Rosanne Robertson
I am currently working with video and installation. I have, since the middle of second year, been interested in the use of the archive and have developed this idea into my current concepts. I am looking at what information is neccessary for something to 'exist' in the artworld. I am looking very closely at the role of the artist.
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Whitechapel Street Project- video viewing space, 'Rosanne Robertson', Digital photograph. Sit yourself down.
# 1 [30 November 2008]
Artists have to be more than creators- we have to be publicists, we have to market our work. I am creating a piece that outlines the difference in the amount of time it takes to create a piece compared to the time it takes to do everything else neccessary for it's existence. With the development in technology- a lap top is all you need to be an artist. Things can be put out there and can exist to a wider audience at the touch of a button (as the resources of this website show and as i will demonstrate when i press 'publish post'). What has to be built up around a piece of art to enable it to be viewed by todays viewer/the public? I aim to create a piece to show and to question these points. I will blog about the developing stages of this work.
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'Transforming Nature 2008', Poster.
# 2 [4 December 2008]
I am currently working as a curator for a student exhibition. I decided that in order to be able to talk about the relationship between artist and curator i should experience things from both sides. I suggested to a fellow student that they losen up their ideas by taking them outside (because she didnt feel she was exploring her ideas fully) and that i would curate the exhibition. This has taken the pressure off the artist to organise the event and has benefited her work greatly.
I am finding working on the other side of things very interesting although not problem free.
I am realising a lot of the issues i have had about the art industry in the past that i have ranted about in a very studenty angsty way are really not that easy to overcome. Seperating entertainment from art and exhibitions is difficult when trying to attract a large audience. Obviously my tactics of 'pulling people in' may be excused on some level- because of the fact that nobody knows who the hell we are (yet ;] ) we have to get people in regardless of their actual interest in contemporary art. So yes... we are offering mince pies.
I now fully understand why there is so much free wine at openings.
If you cant beat them join them- were having bloody mulled wine.
All jokes aside, its going to be a brilliant exhibition and i am enjoying working with Val Kerry lots.
****EVERYONE INVITED****
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Hi Amy, yeah it was a great experience- hard work though, learned a lot from it. I doubt if any of the universities organise exhibitions for students- as it is very important to discover this process for yourself and to discover the motivation to do it yourself. If you want to do it then do what we did- you are not going to get an exhibition in a gallery (just yet) so you have to think of other ways of doing it. We found a public space suitable for the exhibition, got the relevant permission- and away we were. Take Damien Hirst for example- his first exhibition, which gained him attention from charles saatchi and nicolas serota, was in a disused docklands administrive block. If you want to do it you should do it now whilst you have the university resources- thats my advice any way. Find some student work in your year that interests you- that you find would challenge you as a curator and organise an exhibition around it. I will let you know what my piece is going to be so you can look out for it =) Hope your work is going well
posted on 2009-02-09 by Rosanne Robertson
That sounds like a great expoerience lady. I've been hoping something would come up where i can experience the curatorial role for ages now, but unfortunately my university wont offer such things, nor do they host enough shows that i could maybe ask to have some input. The only shows we have is our final end of year shows and i doubt i'd be allowed to have input on that. PS: I'll be going to MMU's final show, i'll now be on the look out for your name in the fine art department!
posted on 2009-02-09 by Amy-Leigh Atkins
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Rosanne Robertson, ''Vito and I'', Found footage/digital video, 2009. stills from video piece. conversation between Vito Acconci and Rosanne Robertson.
# 3 [1 February 2009]
Having handed my dissertation in week before last i have been very excited to get stuck into some work but instead have been spending a lot of time writing up my journal. I wanted to write what i have learned through my research. The most interesting part of my dissertation was looking at new galleries- the gallery which represented contemporary art most sucessfully, for me, was the QUAD in Derby. If you get the chance you should go. It is a great space, i was especially impressed with the representaion of Bill Drummonds process based piece called '17'.
I have also been doing some actual practical work- my current piece is a video piece using footage from Vito Acconci's 'Theme Song', 1974. I have aimed to bring his audience into the same space as him- by filming a response using modern song lyrics in the same way that he does in his piece. It is interesting to see how this piece changes when it is turned into a conversation. For exhibiting this piece is shown on two monitors facing each other- me on one- him on the other.
It will be part of a group exhibition at the 'Link Gallery' at MMU Art School from Monday 2nd Feb - 6th Feb.
I will post reactions and footage of the exhibition soon.
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hi rosanne. do questions become less important over time... maybe the answers simply get shorter. i think i'm still answering a question about drummond's work, engaging people in work and what makes me tick, abstracted over time to something else. drummond's work was used as a vehicle to launch awareness of quad. unfortunatley i was already informed so the drummond piece was what it was. the artifact photos showed a lack of integrity that the work initially promised. the participation thing is about confidence and if someone doesn't want to participate, maybe they just need an extended hand to help them with the next step. the last part is posted as a blog entry. i'm struggling with confidence myself at the moment. are these answers very cold and to the point?
posted on 2009-02-10 by andrew martyn sugars
hi rosanne i'm considering what makes me tick, and will respond soon. andrew.
posted on 2009-02-09 by andrew martyn sugars
[cont'd] Answering your question about the ground level gallery space- i wasn't exactly amazed by it- it was a good space- perfect for works such as the Wilson Twins video installation because of the simplicity and the blacked out walls- the ceiling structure was on the other hand very impressive- i enquired about this and it has been totally rigged up- so that video and projection works are goingto work very well- also i found out that the structure of the room in changable- creating the right amoubnt of space for a piece- which is very important when it comes to successful curating. I have seen pieces- lets take jane and louise wilson for example seen as though were on the subject- such as 'A free and annonymous monument', 2003 which i believe was given too much space for its intallation to be totally sucessful. I believe your statement/assumption that the Wilson twins in a way 'did not put the effort in' very bold and i would perhaps go so far as to say untrue. I learned from the staff that the piece was hung on a structure that was designed and had elements of local watchmakers technology- these inventive collaborations of this level- take time, a lot of time, communication and effort- this is not possible to achieve by having a chat on a train. I find it very strange if that is what you meant- as the wilson twins work is all about community and the areas local to the places in which they exhibit- i believe i cant even contemplate that statement unless it is more informed. So we have found out a little about what you dont like- so what makes you tick mr sugars?
posted on 2009-02-04 by Rosanne Robertson
yeah of course it is a honeymoon period. I myself was very cynical before viewing the space (by the way the word space has no connotations- i simply use it instead of gallery/museum/centre etc) sorry if it confused you. I was however impressed with the quad- i cant really explain that any further other than to say- i enjoyed not being bombarded with unnecessary information. I left the gallery feeling that i had seen something new and that the set up of the contemporary centre is, in my opinion, moving in the right direction. Rather than the direction that may have been taken with the big contemporary centres such as baltic- gateshead- where i find there is too much emphasis on documentation- and not enough emphasis on events. Publicly funded galleries have a difficult task- and any small changes are because of a much larger effort behind the scenes. I think this should be taken into consideration- as much as it is essential to be critical is it also essential to be positive about changes we believe to of benefit to the industry in which we would like to work. You seem very negative about the work of Drummond and perhaps a little down on the future of the 'Quad'- whats the story? In relation to any repeated participants of the 17 project- i felt more respect for getting approximately 289 to participate than play games aimed at a small flaw. I felt this respect because of knowing first hand the difficulty of getting just one person to take time out of their day to be involved in a project- because of the nature of my own work- it is very difficult- do you have any experience of this yourself?
posted on 2009-02-04 by Rosanne Robertson
ok, so i understand better now where you are coming from. i do however struggle with 'the space that interested me the most'. i struggle as that is very ambigous for me. do you mean the formal gallery space on the ground floor or the entire public space contained within the building? are you simply saying the ground floor space in quad is the biggest in the new buildings you visited? as far as i understand drummond was invited to do 17 in derby in order to raise awareness of the opening of quad. there is an element of participation within the work which was captured by the photographs of the groups placed on the wall after the buidling opened. i liked to play how many people appear more than once in the group photos. i didn't see the performance and i chose not to be involved in the making of the notes. the nature of drummond's process seems to be another thread of thought away from display of contemporary art. getting back to display, the wilson twins cited the cube structure's inclusion in their work as something they had wanted to do for a while and the height of the space allowed them to finally use it. quite deflating for a city struggling to know what it is to have a site specific peice made from process based practioners that seemingly didn't do much more research than a discussion on the train on the way to derby from london. it was the first piece of work made by the wilson twins that i had seen, i was rather disappointed with it. on a much more positice note, a member of the council liked it as it showed derby in a good light. quad is still in a honeymoon period in which the bride and groom are still getting to know each other and there is potentially an unhappy marriage ahead unless some honesty, fun and space to breath are found quite soon.
posted on 2009-02-03 by andrew martyn sugars
yeah, sure, i didnt say Quad IS the most successful gallery at representing contemporary art- in my opinion out of the galleries that i visited, when looking at ways process based art may be viewed i found Quad the space that interested me the most. I visited Quad, new art exchnage-nottingham, mima- middlesbrough, ceri hand- liverpool and saatchi gallery-chealsea I am aware of Drummonds work yes, and i am aware of the event happened previous to the opening of the gallery and that it is an on-going project for Drummond. The gallery and staff were part of this particular execution process though - yes? which is what i was interested in. I found it refreshing that the level of effort put into the event did not neccessarily filter into an over-reaction when it came to presenting the information about it. I learned about it what i wanted to and what i found appropriate for an artist who likes to delete somethings existence as soon as it exists. Perhaps there were too many photographs of participants if i was going to be picky- but apart from that for an event that i did not witness first hand- i was happy not to learn every single things about it- with videos and documentation--as i believe this level of documentation is becoming too much. what did you think of the space? Did you see this piece by Drummond?
posted on 2009-02-02 by Rosanne Robertson
hi rosanne. could you elaborate why quad is the most successful gallery at representing contemporary art. were you aware that drummond had executed that process prior to derby? what other new galleries did you look at?
posted on 2009-02-02 by andrew martyn sugars
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Rosanne Robertson, ''Vito and I' ', Found footage/digital video, 2009. Photograph of installtion view.
# 4 [8 February 2009]
After my recent exhibition i have realised how annoying it is watching people viewing my work.
in the future i am going to avoid this by not going to my own opening nights and getting footage/photos when the place is shut.
I had a video installation- which consisted of two tv monitors facing each other. I was on one screen and vito acconci was on the other- this was a conversation scenario, so the two screens had to be viewed simultaneously- watching one person at a time kind of defied the point.
But thats what people did- stood in front of one screen for 5 minutes, then stood in front of the other screen for five minutes and then walked away. I put this down to people being so used to a certain way of viewing art. I dont know if anyone has seen the art gallery sketch on the comedy 'snuff box' but it is very much like that. I could have moved the screens closer together to make it more obvious that it was a conversation- but that would be ridiculous- instead i just learned that you have to deal with people making their own interpretations of your work- intended or not. This sounds like a very obvious thing to say, i know, its just the first non 2D piece i have exhibited =)
this has lead me to do some work which looks at how we view art- i will post more about this soon.
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this is interesting. we're doing a workshop at the moment using found video footage, it is so much fun! one of my tutors, Volker Eichelman has spent over 10 years gathering found footage from film and tv about any references to art, galleries or the art world - it's a huge archive and really amazing! i wish i could find some examples online but am yet to...
posted on 2009-02-13 by Turn Hurst
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Rosanne Robertson, ''Don't Fuck This Up'', Ink on paper, 2009. This pad of paper says a lot about peoples attitudes towards blame and pressure. Lets write a to do list for this beautiful morning- ok, 'Don't fuck up' no no i won't, i wasnt planning on fucking up ' Don't fuck up' i won't, i will try not too fuck up. 'Don't fuck up' I'm trying not to. 'Don't fuck up' what if i do, what if i fuck up? ' Don't fuck up' Oh shit what if i fuck up- i'm scared- i might fuck up everyday. 'Don't fuck up' I think i'm fucking up. 'Dont fuck up' Everthing might fuck up, fuck it, i'm not fucking trying, its fucked, it is fucked up.
# 5 [9 February 2009]
I asked my girlfriend advice on how to keep a blog interesting (as she is a very successful gobshite and had best read blog on chortle comedy website) - she said to be honest- and to tell people everything.
So here is a little bit of a story. In my first year a painted very bad paintings. Very bad. I was happy and content in a relationship that was leading to dreams of a 'nice' house with 'nice' things and so on- you know the type. I was painting very bad paintings.
During the summer between 1st and second year this 3 and a half year relationship finished- to be more precise i had the piss ripped out of me- was cheated on and made to look like a tool... i was a mess.
I didnt want to go back to uni- what was the point? everything was worthless- bla.
But i did go back.
And i was angry and depressed- i produced work about the whole thing and about who it had turned me into- i left painting behind in search of faster forms of expression. I started trying to execute ideas when they first freshly came into my mind- i was producing better work- a lot better.
I haven't looked back- i am loving working with art objects/installation/video/process.
Dont ever be content.
Be challenged.
I will carry on with my story between other blogs.
Thanks for listening =)
ps. sorry for bad photo- camera troubles.
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Rosanne Robertson, ''You Now Stink of Art'', Ink on paper, ink on wood, 2009. Some of my pieces end up reduced to a satement or a question- mainly questions. I will spend hours thinking about something in particular and a simple sentence will come out. Trying to do something more in depth in some cases is not neccessary.
# 6 [10 February 2009]
Thinking of the degree show and what pieces or piece i want to represent my work is buzzing around my head constantly.
There is one piece that i was sure i wanted to be at the degree show and now i am not so sure. I get bored of ideas and pieces very quickly.
This is getting better though, as there was a point where i couldn't actually keep interested in an idea long enough to make anything from it last year.
The piece i have been thinking about using will feed off and 'use' elements of the show itself. as in a new piece will be created from it. This is the problem with a lot of my work- it doesnt end. There is no definate end point. As such, using a piece that seems more definately finished may be a better approach.
I don't know- i will most likely go with some last minute idea.
I am going to sit in a gallery tomorrow after the presentation and watch people looking at art as part of a new piece. I have chosen gallery 10 - the mezzanine court of the Whitworth gallery in Manchester. It is a very peaceful place and i love the architecture.
fun
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Rosanne Robertson, ''Love me please'', ink on paper, 2009. Log books to accompany online piece, which will be part of final exhibition.
# 7 [12 February 2009]
Bloomberg new contemporary deadline has been extended! I messed up before and didn't get my submission in- phew.
So i have been photographing the log books from an on-line piece i have doing and getting all of the relative footage edited together from my recent exhibited video piece. I have also found the perfect place to exhibit one of my other pieces which is a collaboration between myself and Shebs Alom of mmu- the piece is performance shown on video. I am performing- and i am very nervous.
I have my presentation next week- so trying to get it clear in my head the 'journey' i have taken. Will no doubt do another blog about this- as i find it helps.
I also have my half way review thing which i am looking forward to- as after that point i am going to create a new set of works.
Mark Wallinger has just been on radio talking through the new exhibition he is curating at Hayward. I'm going down to the capital in two weeks- looking forward to see his show and his work as curator.
Any other suggestions of london exhibitions from any one?
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Rosanne, i blogged about loads of London exhibitions on my blog the other day http://rosatyhurstart.blogspot.com/ & i guess you're going to the triennale? too :)
posted on 2009-02-13 by Turn Hurst
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Rosanne Robertson, ''Process 1' ', Photograph, pencil on graph paper, digital photograph, 2009. Planning the route of something and then having the course or the process changed by an act that i didnt control.
# 8 [16 February 2009]
I had my half way thingy today. It went really well- i managed to explain exactly what i was doing- which i don't always manage without getting all twisty faced and flustered =o
I had been getting quite nervous about the degree show and having the pieces that i want to represent my work ready and produced to the best possible standards i can achieve. But my tutor said not to worry about it too much- to keep it in the back of my mind and remember that pieces have to be installed- but not think of it first. It is important to carry on creating without presentation in mind up to a certain point- i suppose it just makes things less rigid.
so, i feel a bit a more relaxed about things now. I am enjoying the 3rd year so much- and i am really enjoying developing my understanding of the art world. I'm glad i havent discovered that i am going to hate it, because a passion to paint does not neccessarily translate in being able to work within the art industry.
But thankfully i think i am going to like it.
I am starting on some new groups of photographs and diagrams. I am aiming to present the idea of process. This is shown by documenting changes a particular place from one photograph to the next, using diagrams and using photos from film and digital. the piece says more than my garbled words.
Presentation on wednesday and i have just realised i have no images from 1st or 2nd year- ah well i'm not a fan of spending too much time talking about the past anyway
RR
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Rosanne Robertson, 'Odd bar event of 'Emellee'', Photograph of screening and event.
# 9 [4 June 2009]
White paint
grey paint
black paint
Despite the never ending coats of paint i am really enjoying setting up my space for the degree show.
My work is going to be shown in various bars and venues with a performance emphasis after i finish uni- so i am savouring having a white cube space as i dont know when it will happen again any time soon. To be honest it is a challenge to try and represent my current piece in such a space.
My piece 'Emellee Was Here, You Were There' has been ongoing for over a year and is not very easily tied down to one medium.
The piece started out as a build up of a character as an alter ego- this character gained information that turned into personality and memory. This quickly changed from an alter ego into a piece to look at how people accept information and how accessible technology changes how we present our selves.
Many stages have occurred and i have gone with what has felt right in terms of which direction to take with it ( not setting any fixed methods etc). The current stage will be shown at the degree show and will inform people of the next stage and how to be involved and interact with the piece.
Hopefully i will be able to represent this quite complicated piece in a way that can be understood without having to list reams of information about the process of the piece.
To recieve an outline of the piece email me on RosanneRobertson1984@gmail.com- this outline sheet will tell you everything you need to start being involved with this travelling interactive piece.
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