PLACE Relinking, Relating, Relaying
An Exhibition by Art Language Location
at The Ruskin Gallery, Cambridge and Gallery 9 @ CB2, Cambridge
25 January – 17 February 2018

‘PLACE. It cannot be circumvented. But if you wish to benefit from this place, which has been given to you, consider that henceforth all the places of the world are converging, even the spaces of the stars… Then you will come to this, which is the most profound knowledge: that the place widens out from its irreducible centre, as much as from its incalculable outer frontiers.’
Edouard Glissant, Tout-Monde.

Download the Catalogue by clicking on the image below (2.2Mb pdf)

Introduction

In 2016, ALL Committee members Robert Good and Rebecca Ilett visited Italy, Austria, Slovenia and Bosnia Herzegovina to meet ALL artists overseas and to sow the seeds for a future cross-cultural, cross-border and multi-locational ALL exhibition. By coincidence, the visit took place in the very same week as the British referendum on Europe, and so our attempt at outreach, engagement and exchange now played out against an increasingly surreal political backdrop and a new mood of retrenchment, exclusion and difference.

The result is PLACE: Relinking, Relating, Relaying, an exhibition in which ALL has invited each of the artists that Robert and Rebecca met on their 2016 visit, along with selected artists from Cambridge, to contribute a work that explores some aspect of boundaries and borders, belonging and connection, relations and exchanges.

Over the intervening 18 months, the numerous Skype calls, email conversations, failed translations, lost cultural references and logistical hurdles have made apparent the problematics of communication and connection. But those very same problems – those gaps in translation – also provide an energy, a liveliness and a dynamic that take us out of our own bubble and serve to remind us of the alternative perspectives, narratives and reference points that exist beyond the routine of our own experiences.

PLACE: Relinking, Relating, Relaying, has its roots in reciprocation and friendship. This exhibition coheres not only around an exploration of the ideas contained in Edouard Glissant’s quotation, which we chose as our shared starting point, but, just as importantly, through our shared endeavour and a desire to reach out and to connect. Art can provide a framework of possibility, creativity and energy that sometimes seems lacking in political discourse.

Robert Good

Artists

Adriana Torregrossa

Andreja Džakušič

Barbara Stefani

Carlo Andreasi

Dalibor Nikolić

Elisa Vladilo

Guillermo Giampietro & Radio Fragola Gorizia

Jo Miller

Maja Rubinić

Neil Horsefield

Nerma Cridge

Sara Lerota

Simon Macuh

Susi Gutiérrez

Véronique Chance

Venues

Ruskin Gallery
Anglia Ruskin University
East Road
Cambridge CB1 1PT
10:00 – 17:00, closed Sunday
entrance via East Road and follow the signs to the Gallery

Gallery 9 @ CB2 until 10 February
9 Norfolk Street
Cambridge
CB1 2LD
11:00 – 17:00, closed Sunday and Monday

Programme

Thursday 25th January: Guided tour, artist talks and launch party at Gallery 9
Thursday 1 February: Performances, workshop and drinks reception at The Ruskin Gallery
Wednesday 7 February: Talk by Nerma Cridge
Click links above for full programme details

Supporters

With many thanks to our sponsors and supporters:

Cambridge School of Art, Anglia Ruskin University, European Cultural Centre, La Dante in Cambridge, Cambridge BID, Gallery 9 @ CB2, and particular thanks to a-n, the Artists Newsletter, for the original travel grant that made it all possible and to Elisa Vladilo in Trieste and Sara Lerota in Mostar who made us feel so welcome and so warmly introduced us to their artist friends and contacts.

Design: Danielle Blyde
Translations: Anna Maugliani, Sara Lerota
Curation: Robert Good, Rosemary Catling and Rebecca Ilett