Collections:

Collaborative
relationships

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Edited Rohini Malik Okon
Publisher Louise Wirz
Design www.axisgraphicdesign.co.uk
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CONTRIBUTORS: Faisal Abdu’Allah’s upcoming
projects include: limited edition artist book in
association with Autograph; Goldfinger collaborative
exploration with malevolent practitioners; and DIS-
ASSEMBLY, Serpentine Gallery school project.
Libby Anson is an independent professional and
creative development coach, writer, artist and
lecturer. Current projects include co-delivering
professional practice programmes for Cockpit Arts
and teaching at the National Portrait Gallery.
Ben Coode-Adams’ work is characterised by
developing innovative solutions that deliver complex
ideas and narratives in an engaging way.
He is co-director of Artefact Projects.
www.bencoodeadams.com.
Juan delGado’s work refers to social and cultural
representations of sexuality, trauma and cruelty in
Western society. In 2005 he set up Cremer Projects,
a platform to promote disabled artists on an
international level. Contact arts.news@virgin.net
Bruce Haines is a writer and curator. He is currently Mah Rana, Beyond the Forest:
‘Throw the comb behind you
Exhibitions Organiser at Camden Arts Centre, London. and even Baba Yaga will get
trapped by the trees that will
Rob Kesseler’s NESTA Fellowship concluded with the sprout from the teeth of the
publication of a major new book on pollen* with Dr comb’, brooch, plastic (fine gold
metallized), 15x2.5cm, 2000.
Madeline Harley. Now working on a second book with
Wolfgang Stuppy from the Millennium Seed Bank, he’s Beyond the Forest is one of an
earlier series of work from the
in early stages of developing a project with University present theme Jewellery is Life.
of Oxford Botanic Garden. www.robkesseler.co.uk After previously working with
* Pollen the Hidden Sexuality of Flowers, Papadakis Publisher, second hand gold wedding
rings a new departure was to
London, 2004, £35, 020 7823 2323. construct a visual language
Rohini Malik Okon is undertaking a PhD in the
through traditional and non
traditional ‘goldsmithing’
Visual Cultures Department at Goldsmiths College, materials to communicate ideas
where she also coordinates the research project of memory, history and
narrative.
‘Translating the Image: Cross Cultural Contemporary
Arts’. From 1995-2001 she worked at inIVA where she In an old Russian fairytale a
young girl is chased by a witch;
was involved with developing numerous projects she has been given advice that
including ‘A Fruitful Incoherence: Dialogues with if she finds herself in trouble
she should throw a comb
Artists on Internationalism’. behind her. The comb turns
into a forest trapping the witch
Keiko Mukaide’s upcoming projects include: a joint in the trees. The young girl
exhibition with Chiho Hitomi in Edinburgh, exhibitions escapes unharmed.

and Scottish Arts Council.
A text-only version of this
publication is available on
www.a-n.co.uk
2 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
at Tate St Ives and in Sweden and public art
commissions in Sheffield, Somerset and Inverness.
Edith Marie Pasquier is an artist who works with
text, sound and moving image. She has contributed
to various publications and has worked with ICA,
English National Opera and Cultural Industry/Artangel
among others.
Johannes Phokela was born in South Africa and
lives and works in London. He has won numerous
awards including a decibel artists’ award, John
Moores Painting Prize and BP Portrait Award.
Mah Rana’s current work highlights the ways we use
jewellery to mark occasions and events, significant or
everyday. This includes Meanings and Attachments,
held in different countries; an ongoing written and
photographic event recording people’s personal
connections to jewellery. www.mahrana.com
Giles Sutherland is a writer, critic and journalist.
His most recent publication is ‘With the Grain’ (Birlinn,
2005) – a study of the life and work of the sculptor
Tim Stead.
Alia Syed’s work embraces a range of film practices,
refusing to sit in a single, definable form. She won
the decibel Visual Arts Award in 2004, is represented
by Talwar Gallery, New York and has solo exhibitions
planned for 2006 in New York and at Millais Gallery,
Southampton.
Hilary Williams is Director of Ditchling Museum,
where she recently curated an exhibition with artist
Jo Roberts and is co-organiser of an international
convention of artists working in rural environments.

Contents
Editorial
Introduction
Rohini Malik Okon
Trust in us
Juan delGado
and The Wellcome Trust
A mutual arrangement
Keiko Mukaide and
Edinburgh College of Art
Time to think and space 10
to talk
Faisal Abdu’Allah and
The Agency Contemporary
Eating grass 12
Alia Syed and inIVA
Gold rush 14
Mah Rana and HAT
Old and new masters 16
Johannes Phokela and Gasworks
Cross-pollination 18
Rob Kesseler and NESTA
COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
Editorial
As part of the publishing programme that marks a-n’s
25th year we’re launching the a-n Collections series.
3 Including anthologies of selected articles from the a-n
archive contextualised by new commentary, and new
4 themed texts selected by guest editors, a-n Collections
are designed to examine and analyse the ‘why, what
6 and how’ of artists’ practice.
The first in the series is Collaborative relationships.
For an independent eye, we asked Rohini Malik Okon,
8 to select from a range of interview-based articles first
published in a-n Magazine in 2003-05 that set out to
explore the mutuality of a working relationship
between an artist and an organisation. By unwrapping
the intricacies of the relationship, the circumstances in
which it came about, identifying where it worked well
and less well and its long term direction, these
interviews provide valuable insights into the reality
of the exchange and a commentary on the inevitable
agendas that inform any professional arrangement in
the arts.
In her introduction, Rohini Malik Okon contextualises
the choices she has made and, through analysis,
considers what the material tells us in a wider sense
about artists’ working relationships and how
contemporary visual arts practice is best supported.
Gillian Nicol
Editor
a-n readers automatically receive a-n Collections that otherwise
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About a-n>Join in
We welcome your proposals for further a-n Collections, send ideas
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3
Introduction
Collaborative relationships between artists and
organisations take a variety of forms, from brief
catalytic encounters, to dynamic exchanges and
dialogues, to long-term partnerships that evolve
organically and fruitfully over a period of time.
The ways in which these relationships operate,
as well as the stories of how they came into being,
reveal as much about contemporary perceptions
of the artist’s role in society as the tangible
realities of maintaining and developing a creative
practice.
Whether through invitation, application,
a chance meeting or a well-received proposal,
the collaborative relationships explored in this
publication have often emerged from a timely
coincidence of strategy and opportunity and have
usually led to mutually beneficial associations.
The remit of each organisation – funding body,
commercial gallery, higher education institute and
publicly-funded arts organisation, amongst others
– is different with respect to their affiliation with
artists. In some cases, the aim is to engage in a
greater understanding of contemporary art
practice by creating opportunities for artists
within dynamic and vigorous programmes as well
as introducing their work to both new audiences
and new markets. In others, the artist and their
work are perceived as a conduit for relaying the
broader concerns of the institution involved,
albeit in a creative and thought-provoking manner.
While some relationships are defined by a sense of
nurturing, where the organisation acts as a
support structure for the artist, others are
characterised more by a notion of cross-
disciplinary exchange, where different
perspectives and ways of working come together
through initiated and managed opportunities. All
involve some level of negotiation, and the striking
of a balance between structure and fluidity.
Although committed to promoting
collaborative ways of working that cut across
traditional academic disciplines and professional
domains, The Wellcome Trust’s primary interest
lies in broadening the public’s understanding and
awareness of scientific rather than artistic values.
Its artist-in-residence scheme, which invites artists
to access an unparalleled array of resources and
expertise on biomedical themes is, from the
Trust’s point of view, about encouraging a more
open interpretation of its collection and providing
a ‘way in’ to its work for the general public. The
practice of creating artists’ residencies in various
work environments has a long history. While such
projects may sometimes be challenging to
establish, with expectations on both sides needing
to be carefully managed – artists are not there
simply to illustrate or depict – when successful
they involve artist and organisation in a mutual
process of discovery and can alter the views of all
concerned. Often a third party is involved, as a
mediator between the two, and/or as initiator of
the collaboration.
NESTA (National Endowment for Science,
Technology and the Arts) claims to work in the
gaps between other funders, supporting
collaborative and cross-disciplinary projects.
4 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
Its fellowship scheme enabled artist Rob Kesseler Rob Kesseler, speaking in
front of staff members from
to make work and develop ideas for three years NESTA at The Royal Botanic
under the auspices of ‘NESTA Fellow at the Royal Gardens, Kew, 5 September
Botanic Gardens, Kew’. Like the Wellcome Trust, 2003.
NESTA’s ultimate responsibility is to the public,
but as an organisation it is committed to
developing organically in response to its
experiences with projects and practitioners.
Where these sorts of collaboration are most
successful is when they are not prescriptive about
‘outcomes’, where the focus for the artist is on
enquiry and experimentation rather than
production necessarily, and where room is left for
the unexpected to occur. What they also highlight
is an increasing recognition of research as a
fundamental aspect of artistic practice, and the
acknowledgment that artists are professionals on
a par with those working in other fields. There is a
slight danger however, where the contribution of
an artist’s practice is not fully understood, of
falling into a new form of commodification where
artists are brought into a project solely for a value
they are perceived to have by being an artist.
The widening acceptance of art as a form of
knowledge production is attested to by the recent
proliferation of Fine Art PhDs, AHRB funded
Creative Fellowships and artists taking up posts as
Research Fellows in various higher education
institutions. Research Fellowships don’t
necessarily follow a particular model. For glass
artist Keiko Mukaide, her position as Research
Fellow at Edinburgh College of Art evolved
organically over a number of years from her initial
non-formalised role as artist-in-residence through
a stint as Teaching Fellow to, with the increasing
pressure on higher education establishments to
earn ‘research points’, her current position. For
Edinburgh College of Art, having such a high
profile, internationally known artist on their staff
enhances its potential to generate income through
its RAE (Research Assessment Exercise)
submission, while Mukaide benefits from a fully-
equipped space in which to make her work as well

Faisal Abdu’Allah, Hayley,
Screenprint on copper and
stone, 50x50cm, 2000. Private
collection, USA.
Alia Syed, Eating Grass, film
still, 2003. Courtesy: the artist
and Talwar Gallery, New York.
COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
as the potential for inter-departmental Support networks can also emerge through less
collaborations and intellectual cross-fertilisation formal, more intermittent collaborations between
that her position enables. artists and curators, and between artists
Whilst some collaborative relationships might themselves, perhaps working with or through an
evolve over a few years, others last only a couple organisation or perhaps circumventing any form
of months yet their impact can be just as fruitful. of institution altogether. Artists may often work
For jeweller Mah Rana, the experience of together as a group to get a project going, and
undertaking a residency in Australia gave her time while there is a real energy in this way of working,
to step away from her usual commitments in the without sufficient funding these collaborations are
UK and she was able to reassess her reasons for not generally sustainable over long periods of
making. Often artists are so caught up with the time, and tend to remain invisible or marginal.
day-to-day demands of making and showing Increasingly, however, artists are also curating
work, that they don’t have time to reflect on their shows, and new modes of practice, collaboration
practice. Rather than a new commission, what is and institution are emerging in parallel to the
needed is ‘breathing space’, and to be offered a more established models of co-relationship.
space to breathe in the form of a residency that As artists today negotiate the pragmatics of
is part of an ongoing international exchange (as making and showing work, and as they attempt to
in the Here and There project) can be extremely balance a desire to be experimental and take risks
rewarding. with the need to make a living and develop a
Supporting the development of an artist’s profile, successful collaborative relationships with
creative process is as important, and in some a variety of organisations can often help shift
ways more important, than securing funding or their practice to another level. Functioning as
arranging publicity for a new piece of work. passageways, breathing spaces or springboards,
The relationship between Faisal Abdu’Allah and these relationships work best when centred
his gallerist Bea de Souza, Director of The Agency around a notion of trust and realised in a spirit
Contemporary in London, is characterised by an of generosity.
open and dynamic dialogue. At the start, de Souza
kept close, giving the artist lots of guidance and Rohini Malik Okon is a writer and researcher based
support, but as their relationship developed she in London. She is currently undertaking a PhD in the
also recognised the importance of stepping back Visual Cultures Department at Goldsmiths College,
and giving him time and space to develop ideas. where she is also the co-ordinator of the research
Confounding some of the negative associations project ‘Translating the Image: Cross Cultural
that commercial galleries attract, The Agency does Contemporary Arts’.
not constantly pressurise the artists it represents
to make new works, and maintains an ethos in
selecting the artists it wishes to work with.
Galleries and arts organisations that
successfully balance visual experience with a self-
reflexive programme are distinguished from other
institutions and spaces by their emphasis on
seasons and strands of programming that adapt
to, and emerge from, the ways in which they work
with artists. inIVA aims to develop a clear,
continuous and open dialogue with both artists
and audiences, and stresses the importance of
context for the showing of work. As well as
offering a contemporary art, rather than cinema,
space for the showing of her films, Alia Syed
suggests that her collaboration with inIVA was
successful partly because of the context, political
and cultural, they developed to show the work.
The spaces in which works are made as well as
those in which they are shown, and the networks
and contacts artists establish with other
practitioners, curators and writers, may also be
determined or shaped by an ongoing collaborative
relationship. In its partnerships with artists,
Gasworks Studios in south London offers a stable
affordable workspace, augmented by an
international visiting artists’ programme and a
curated programme of exhibitions and talks in the
galleries below, but perhaps the most valuable
aspect of this relationship is the strong sense of
community and mutual support fostered by the
organisation.
INTRODUCTION 5
Trust in us
Libby Anson talks to Juan delGado and The
Wellcome Trust about his residency.
Established in 1936, The Wellcome Trust is an
independent medical research-funding charity with
a mission “to foster and promote research with the
aim of improving human and animal health”. It also
“seeks to raise awareness of the medical, ethical
and social implications of research and promote
dialogue between scientists, the public and policy
makers”. One of the ways in which it does this is
to encourage access to its work and to the issues
raised via exhibitions (such as ‘Medicine Man’ at the
British Museum, ‘Treat Yourself’ at The Science
Museum, and at the TwoTen Gallery within the
Trust itself) and through other science and art
initiatives. The Exhibitions Unit in the Trust’s
Medicine, Society and History Division initiated the
annual SciArt grant scheme in 1996. A year later,
the Science on Stage and Screen Awards, a biennial
competition for live theatre, digital and broadcast
media, were launched; the two schemes later
merged. The latter initiative was introduced,
primarily, to broaden the public’s understanding
and awareness of scientific, rather than artistic
values. The Trust has since supported diverse arts-
related projects featuring artists such as Franko B
and Dorothy Cross, fashion designer Helen Storey
and Forkbeard Fantasy Theatre Company: “Our
motivation in these activities,” says Dr Ken Arnold,
Head of Exhibitions, “is focused on the Trust’s
commitment to engaging the public in informed
dialogue about biomedical science”. Describing the
Trust’s approach to engaging with creatives as
“broad and eclectic”, Arnold declares that its aims
are to draw in and educate a wider audience, to
exploit different languages through which to
communicate biomedical subjects and ideas,
to provoke reaction and to promote collaborative
ways of working that, “cut across traditional
academic disciplines and professional domains”1.
From 2000 to 2002 SciArt was coordinated by a
consortium of the Trust, Arts Council England,
British Council, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation,
NESTA, and the Scottish Arts Council. The Trust has
re-launched the scheme on its own, with the
possibility of spending up to one million pounds
on science and art grants over the next two years.
The Exhibitions Unit also manages an artist-in-
residence scheme, run by Abbie Hampton under the
guidance of Denna Jones. Juan delGado was the
sixth artist-in-residence at The Wellcome Trust
since the scheme’s inauguration in September 2000.
Two six-month residencies per year have been
awarded since, via a submission process open to
artists who have recently completed a UK-based
postgraduate degree in the visual arts. The end of
delGado’s residency in August 2003 marked the end
of the scheme, which had previously featured
Andrea Roe, Aya Ben Ron, Alexandre Da Cuhna,
Gonzalo Paramo Pino and William Cobbing.
“Like many Trust initiatives”, explains Ken Arnold,
“the scheme ran for a set time and has completed
what it first set out to do.” There were three key
objectives: to encourage interesting young artists
to draw on the Trust’s resources, especially those of
the Wellcome Library, and to work with biomedical
themes, to produce interesting work whilst there
and to interact with the staff and the organisation
6 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
Juan delGado, Angela, c-print,
Valencia, 1991.
Juan delGado, Anmia, c-print,
Valencia, 1993.
1 From Why Art?, Ken Arnold,
Head of Exhibitions, The
Wellcome Trust.
as a whole. Resident artists received a studio at
The Wellcome Trust (to be open by appointment),
a fee (paid in monthly installments), access to a
photographic studio, the facilities provided by the
Trust’s Audiovisual Services department and the
resources of the Wellcome Library for the History
and Understanding of Medicine. In addition, each
artist supplied monthly updates and written
evaluation, attended meetings and presented public
and staff events. Such a thought-provoking process
not only resulted in strong and powerful work being
produced but it also offered delGado unexpected
outcomes. He feels he achieved a certain
professional status, and he became self-employed
through the scheme.
Overall, the scheme made for a mutually
beneficial relationship, within which, like an
arranged marriage, occasional differences were
inevitable. Dr Michael Clark, Head of the Medical
Film and Audio Collections in the Wellcome Library,
was one of those who provided practical help and
support to those artists on the scheme who
required an introduction to the Trust’s wide-ranging
video collection. He sees the relationship as a
“constructive business partnership”, with the artist
as a “favoured customer” and the Trust as “the
supplier” of resource and research materials and
developmental and exhibiting opportunities. The
main challenge was the last of the three objectives –
the interaction between the artist and the staff and
organisation. “The artists met many sympathetic
and interested individuals”, stated Arnold, “but the
difficulty was getting people here to find the time to
take an interest in the artists, when they were
occupied with the demands of their own work….
Part of the work of staff in the Exhibitions Unit was
to manage expectations on both sides.” For artists
wishing to participate in the scheme, the selection
criteria – even accounting for mature students –
undeniably introduced an element of ageism which
made it exclusive. The relative youth of the artists
selected also affected the way in which their
experience was viewed by some within the Trust.
Could they really know what they were doing?
Reactions against the unfamiliar extend wider into
the fabric of the organisation as its activities and
interests diversify – from having a film library and
links to youth theatre, to supplying materials to
women’s magazines. That such progressive forays
have not been universally supported, it must be
said, is probably more indicative of a general
human response, rather than being unique to
Wellcome. However, any ripples are bound to be
most keenly felt by the single outsider – the artist-
in-residence – leaving, perhaps, a certain sense of
inequality.
After gaining a diploma in photography in
Valencia, Spain, in 1997 delGado came to study
Contemporary Media Practice at the University of
Westminster, graduating in Media Arts in 2001.
Over the past decade, he has produced an extensive
body of work – combining photography, installation,
film and video – relating to the subjects of
displacement, trauma and identity. The Wellcome is
the third residency with which delGado has been
involved since 2002. At the Vivid Media Centre in

Juan delGado, Untitled #2,
c-print, London, 1997. From
The Wounded Image series.
2 Juan delGado in
conversation with Elizabeth
Cowie at the conference,
Culture and the Unconscious –
Psychoanalysts, Artists and
Academics in Dialogue, School
of Oriental and African
Studies, London, 11-12 July,
2003.
3 Ibid.
Juan delGado, Untitled #15,
c-print, London, 2001. From
The Wounded Image series.
Birmingham, as part of the PVA LabCulture, he
developed Who are you entertaining to? – a video
piece enquiring into cruelty while questioning his
social/political role as an artist. Under the AA2A
(Artists Access to Art Colleges) scheme, in
collaboration with the London Metropolitan
University and bringing together various art
practitioners, he has made Flêche Sans Corps,
an interdisciplinary project which observes the
traumatic experiences that many so-called ‘illegal’
immigrants go through after leaving their
countries.
DelGado was attracted to the Trust’s scheme
because it was research and development based,
with production occurring after completion of the
residency period. He had been awarded a digital
media bursary via Artsadmin which he had also
used to contribute to his research at Wellcome.
The basic premise of his proposal to the Trust was
to consider schizophrenia from a social position –
that of a disabled artist – not from a scientist’s or
medic’s point of view. He wanted to use himself as
the subject of a film and of five photographic
prints, to re-enact the disabled body. Throughout
the residency he researched books on the anatomy
of madness and psychiatry and illness – in
particular, for example, The Anatomy of Madness,
edited by Bill Bynum, Roy Porter and Michael
Shepherd. He also studied early films on
schizophrenia held in the Iconographic Collections
and historical images in the Medical Photographic
Library. The paintings, illustrations and etchings in
the Trust collections also provided inspiration.
Such research offered delGado insight into the
perceptions and the social and cultural constructions
of mental illness over time.
DelGado was also looking forward to the
collaborative aspect of the residency, forming a
part, albeit temporarily, of a large organisation and
engaging with its various departmental
communities. Like most established institutions,
the Wellcome is subject to bureaucracy, opinions,
hierarchies and traditions. It is not surprising,
therefore, that hosting a single artist in the midst
of what amounts to a large, diverse group of people
is a task not without its challenges for both parties.
The first of these is clarification of purpose. For
those more conservative in their approach, for
example, the idea of an artist-in-residence
represents the disturbing presence of an arbiter of
non-scientific values. To others, the notion conjures
up an image of a superior interior decorator: “Some
of the ideas that the artists came up with inevitably
were new to the Trust’s culture”, concedes Ken
Arnold. “Juan’s approach was highly distinctive…
COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
bringing his special interests to bear on a particular
area of the history/culture of biomedicine – namely
that to do with disability and some aspects of
sexuality…. He was clearly an artist interested in
the idea of inter-disciplinary investigation – a core
value of the scheme”.
In the context of any residency, artistic freedom
and interpretation is an aspect that can prove
controversial. It may seem curious that having
selected an artist – using a panel including both
internal and external judges from the science and
art worlds – that individual’s practice, during the
residency, is subject to veto and censorship.
However, the Wellcome’s overall policy is to engage
with the public. Its rationale is to increase public
access to and awareness of its work and anything
that threatens to repel the general audience it seeks
to attract is likely to be regarded as unacceptable.
One could argue that this introduces a value
judgment, limiting subversive ideas to art that is
humorous rather than seriously shocking –
particularly in publicly designated areas of the
trust. delGado’s photographic series dealing with
the themes of representation of gender,
Transformers, 1989-1995 and L’Androgyne Sexuel,
1994-1996, were presented at Bentley House. His
video projection, Loving Machine, 1998, was shown
in the reception area of the Trust’s headquarters at
183 Euston Road. The latter is an exploration of
how technology takes on an existence of its own,
eschewing the body and human relationships.
delGado originally proposed to exhibit his more
disturbing yet compelling photographic series, The
Wounded Image, 1997-2002, for display. Beautified,
horrifying scenarios, these ‘real’ and timeless
images refer to violence and to child abuse; they
confront the viewer with the ‘skillfully arranged’
aftermath of traumatic experience. Each tableau,
like a still from a gruesome re-enactment, provides
a mirror of the universal fears, anxieties and
fantasised realities of the dangerous and brutal
aspects of our society for which we are all
responsible. They also question how we relate to
trauma and to its representation. delGado himself
views this work, “as a visual discourse on the
subject of cruelty and the emotional relations that
this matter brings to the audience”, and a way to,
“… give my past a recognisable shape so I can begin
to engage with a dialogue through which the
unspeakable can be taken in hand”2. Selected in
1997 for the John Kobal Photographic Awards, The
Wounded Image was considered too graphic for
display by the Trust.
Michael Clark thinks that through the scheme,
artist and organisation are, essentially, involved in
a mutual process of discovery and investigation,
with the artists providing unique connections
between items in the Trust’s collections. Ultimately,
this allows a more open interpretation of academic
analyses and dialogue, using the artist’s unique
approach to combine “facts and the unconscious”3 –
the highly positive result of a fruitful, if
challenging collaboration.
Libby Anson
With special thanks to Dr Ken Arnold,
Dr Michael Clark and Verity Slater.
Contact:
The Wellcome Trust
215 Euston Road, London NW1 2BE
020 7611 8888
contact@wellcome.ac.uk
www.wellcome.ac.uk
First published: a-n Magazine December 2003
TRUST IN US 7
A mutual arrangement
Giles Sutherland looks at the relationship
between glass artist Keiko Mukaide and
Edinburgh College of Art.
Born in Tokyo in 1954, glass artist Keiko Mukaide
came to London in 1989 to study at the Royal
College of Art where she gained an MA in Ceramics
and Glass. In Japan, Mukaide had originally trained
and worked as a graphic designer, with her work in
glass merely acting as a creative side-line pursued
in her spare time.
Eventually, this pastime became all-consuming
and following her creative instincts she took up
glass-work as a full-time artistic calling. Such a leap
was partially triggered by her participation in some
life-altering workshops at Dale Chihuly’s Pilchuck
Glass School in Seattle, USA. From such modest
beginnings, Mukaide’s work has risen to a position
of international prominence. Her work is included
in some of the world’s most prestigious glass
collections such as the Corning Museum of Glass in
the USA, The Victoria and Albert Museum, UK, the
Glasmuseet Ebeltoft in Denmark and the
Kunstgewerbemuseum in Hamburg.
Mukaide’s artistic practice has evolved from
making one-off pieces for galleries and showrooms
to large, site-specific installations that not only
resonate with the physical environment but,
crucially, delve deeper into a more poetic and
spiritual acknowledgement of space and time.
Recent examples of this approach have included
‘Elemental Traces’ (with Diana Hobson and Craig
Mackay) at the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh;
‘Miegakari’ (with Tokiko Furuuchi) at Charles Rennie
Mackintosh’s Hill House in Helensburgh and ‘Spirit
of Place’ at the University of Edinburgh’s Talbot Rice
Gallery. On the strength of her plans to complete a
subtle, multi-layered installation in the garden of
Mackintosh’s masterpiece, Mukaide won a £25,000
Creative Scotland Award in 2001.
Mukaide’s links with Edinburgh College of Art
(ECA) go back to the early 1990s: “I was a young
graduate from the RCA and I needed space to work.
I knew the glass department at ECA and its head,
Ray Flavell, who already knew of my work.
I approached him for the use of some working
space. The arrangement was that I was given this
in return for teaching. It was an exchange: they
gave me some accommodation and I gave them
some teaching. This situation continued for about
five years.”
Both parties agreed that the arrangement was
working well with mutual benefits ensuing for both,
although with no money changing hands. In 1996,
with funding from the Binks Trust, Mukaide’s
position was formalised and she was officially
made a Teaching Fellow at ECA. Her duties were
primarily based on working with undergraduates
in the glass department.
As was the case with other art schools, the late
1990s saw the increasing formalisation of academic
structure and teaching practice at ECA. Assessment,
teaching and learning as well as internal structures
developed along the lines of more traditional,
university-based education. With the introduction
of the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) and the
awarding of funding from the Scottish Office (later
the Scottish Executive) via the Scottish Higher
Education Funding Council, institutions such as
ECA effectively competed for a slice of the finite
8 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
funding pie. Brutally simplified, the more points an
institution gains, the more funding is released.
Recognising this increasingly competitive
funding environment, in 1997 ECA appointed Dr
Andrew Patrizio as Director of Research (Art and
Design). Patrizio’s role is diverse and varied but he
is one of the key players in developing ECA’s
Research Vision that “recognises that research
drives creativity, new knowledge and innovation in
all the subjects areas in which the college
specializes”. Thus, the continuing development of
research (and the appointment of Research Fellows)
has become a crucial element in ECA’s evolution.
From Teaching Fellow, Mukaide’s role was again
transformed (in 1999) into Research Fellow.
Although most of ECA’s five other Research Fellows
were appointed in 1998, Patrizio concludes that
Mukaide’s route was “a little different” moving from
an already existing artist-in-residence post through
to teaching and then research.
Explaining Mukaide’s position, Patrizio says:
“Research Fellows are expected to do no more than
six hours a week ‘contact time’ but this is rarely in
the form of teaching. Keiko does do talks, but they
are not regular. We do like to link research activity
with teaching, but it varies in different cases.
All Research Fellows have contracts and job
descriptions, but there is deliberately scope to
discuss specific modifications of that role between
each Research Fellow and ECA depending on
mutual benefit. Keiko has had teaching and
mentoring roles within Design and Applied Arts,
though this has widened now to go beyond one
single school.”
The deliberately open-ended nature of
Mukaide’s post enables her to work in a way that
ECA evidently believes will have maximum creative
benefits for both institution and artist. Mukaide
comments: “There is no formal structure for
collaboration/communication between these
Keiko Mukaide, Secret Garden
individuals. I work for one and a half days a week. (detail). Jerwood Prize for
There is no such thing as a typical working day.” Applied Art – Glass, Crafts
Council, London, 1998.
This arrangement, Mukaide believes, is
beneficial for both parties. The limited space and Keiko Mukaide, Nacreous
technical facilities offered by her own private Clouds. The Royal Botanic
Garden, Edinburgh, 2000.
studio spaces (located in the WASPS studios in
Patriothall, Edinburgh) means that by necessity she
must use the more extensive workshops offered by
ECA. This is particularly the case when preparing
for such large installations as those she created for
her recent Helensburgh and Edinburgh shows.
Reciprocally, the pay-offs for ECA are various
and extensive. All publications and other publicity
created by Mukaide for her exhibitions must credit
ECA – as evidenced by the prominent ECA logo
(along with a host of private sponsors) in the
catalogues for ‘Elemental Traces’ and ‘Spirit of
Place’. As a Research Fellow, Mukaide is
encouraged, if not required, by ECA to apply for
a range of funding opportunities and to seek
exposure in prestigious international exhibitions
venues.
Recently she has submitted an application to
the Arts and Humanities Research Board and
directly links the 2003 tour of ‘Spirit of Place’ to
Denmark’s acclaimed glass museum at Ebeltoft

Keiko Mukaide, Spirit of Place,
main installation spiral. Talbot
Rice Gallery, 2003. Photo:
Shannon Tofts.
Keiko Mukaide, Spirit of Place,
detail of main installation
spiral. Talbot Rice Gallery,
2003. Photo: Shannon Tofts.
COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
to ECA’s Research Vision. The stated aims of this
strategy are “that ECA enhances its international
profile as a centre for study, research and
innovation” partly by means of “conducting
collaborative partnerships across the globe”.
Having such a high profile, internationally-
known artist on the staff additionally allows ECA
to generate income through its RAE submission.
As Patrizio says: "When we are audited all staff
deemed to be working at a strong level in terms of
research are put in our submission. Keiko Mukaide
certainly is in this category. After all of the
universities and colleges have been rated, unit by
unit, the funding that comes to us is based on our
overall grade, the size of our staff, and our research
culture. We don’t view it as an atomised income –
eg, ‘this member of staff earns us this amount of
money’ – as the assessment process doesn’t really
work this way. It is more holistic. But yes, having
her on the books converts loosely into the
calculation of a core grant for ECA."
The ‘roving brief’ allowed to Mukaide through
her contractual position acts as a catalyst for inter-
departmental collaboration and intellectual cross-
fertilisation. She explains: “It’s given me more
opportunity to work with others who specialise in
different fields. Because ECA is an institution with
a departmental structure it’s easier to make contact
with and get to know others working throughout
the college. For example, at the Hill House show,
I needed the input of a landscape architect and I
was able to make contact with Tokiko Furuuchi, a
graduate of landscape architecture at ECA. She was
working in Japan but I invited her to come to work
with me in Helensburgh. Also, the head of
department helped me to find people who could
give me some technical input.”
The organic definition of Mukaide’s role is
clearly ECA’s intent, allowing for maximum creative
development through chance meetings and
naturally occurring collaborations. A more rigidly
defined structure would clearly produce different
but not necessarily better results. It’s an
experiment that is evidently producing excellent
results for both parties.
Giles Sutherland is a freelance writer specialising in
the visual arts.
Contact:
Keiko Mukaide
keikomukaide@hotmail.com
Edinburgh College of Art
Lauriston Place, Edinburgh EH3 9DF
0131 221 6000
www.eca.ac.uk
First published: a-n Magazine April 2004
A MUTUAL ARRANGEMENT 9
Time to think and space to talk
Rohini Malik Okon explores the evolving relationship
between Faisal Abdu’Allah and The Agency Contemporary.

When Faisal Abdu’Allah received a phone call from

Bea de Souza, Director of The Agency
Contemporary, in the summer of 1998 he had
seriously been considering giving up his practice
as an artist and concentrating solely on his other
creative pursuit (which he still maintains today)
as a hairdresser in the barber’s shop he owns in
Harlesden, West London. Frustrated at being
constantly pigeonholed as a ‘black artist’ and being
offered ‘education’ projects as opposed to
commissions, he had begun to feel that he wasn't
really going anywhere with his work. When he
received a call from the director of a contemporary
commercial gallery in the heart of London’s East
End offering him a solo show, he was more than a
little taken aback.
De Souza had been following Abdu’Allah’s work
for a number of years, after having come across
him in a show at the Photographers’ Gallery in the
early 1990s. The large-scale photographic portraits
of rappers screenprinted on to metal had a definite
impact on her, but at that point she wasn’t sure
what to do with the work. Wanting to know that
there was more to these portraits than their
deliberately confrontational stance, she waited to
see if they would resonate with her for a long while
after seeing the show.
They did, and she kept somehow coming back
to the work. While engaging with the media
stereotype of the young black aggressor, there was
something in the images which moved beyond the
initial provocation. A few years later when she saw
‘Heads of State’, a solo show which powerfully
evoked feelings of loss and a sense of grieving,
de Souza was confirmed in her desire to approach
Abdu’Allah with a view to offering him not only an Faisal Abdu’Allah, Eyes Faisal Abdu’Allah, SPA School
opportunity to show his work but also to represent without a face, installation, Black Heroes, screenprints on
2000. perspex, 2002.
him as his gallerist.
After their initial meeting Abdu’Allah felt Faisal Abdu’Allah, SPA School
Black Heroes (detail),
overwhelmed and was a little hesitant about screenprints on perspex, 2002.
entering into the relationship. He was anxious that
he would have to change his work in order for it to
Clive Kofi Allen and
be commercially viable. But de Souza reassured
Faisal Abdu’Allah, The Last
him that the reason she wanted him to join the Supper Diptych, 2 C-Prints
gallery was the strength of his work and she didn’t framed. Collection: Arts Council
England.
want him to change his practice but rather to grow
and develop as an artist. There is an underlying
ethos behind the selection of artists who are
represented by The Agency: while their material
processes may be very different they are all in
some way dealing with and questioning
representations of social reality.
Working primarily through photography,
screenprint and installation and appropriating
iconography from the media, religion and popular
culture, Abdu’Allah challenges cultural stereotypes
and questions preconceived ideas around identity.
For de Souza, it was important to represent an artist
who was working critically with contemporary social
concerns, while for Abdu’Allah it was important to
work with an agent who understood notions of
cultural difference, not by identifying him as a
‘black artist’ or jumping on the ‘cultural diversity’
bandwagon, but by engaging with both the material
and thematic qualities of his work.

10 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS


Like most successful relationships, that between
Faisal Abdu’Allah and The Agency has evolved
through a process of negotiation and has been
characterised from the start by an open and
dynamic dialogue. At the beginning de Souza kept
close and gave the artist a lot of guidance and
support, advising him on which shows to
participate in, and perhaps more importantly gave
him the confidence to say “no” to people.
While gallerists are often viewed with some
suspicion and seen as being solely interested in
making money from the artists they represent, de
Souza confounds this and talks about the invisible
support that a gallerist can give to an artist,
catching them when they fall and acting as a
sounding board for, and provocateur of, ideas. At
one stage she pointed out to Abdu’Allah that most
of his images were of men and that he very rarely
made work depicting women. He went on to
produce a series of powerful and moving female
portraits. De Souza also recognises the importance
of stepping back and giving an artist time to think
and develop ideas, and is not constantly
pressurising Abdu’Allah to make new work. This is
of course of benefit to both artist and gallery – if
the artist is making stronger work, the gallery’s
profile and reputation is enhanced.
For Abdu’Allah, being given time to develop his
practice without feeling pressurised to make a
particular kind of work has been extremely
valuable. When he was developing ‘The Garden of
Eden’, his recent and most ambitious project to
date, he didn’t talk to de Souza for about three
months. Shown at Chisenhale Gallery in Autumn
2003 and then at Aspex Gallery, ‘Garden of Eden’
was a powerful architectural installation (made in
collaboration with architect David Adjaye) that
explored issues of privilege, exclusion and
voyeurism and engaged the viewer in a charged
physical experience. The work had been in his head
for a long time, perhaps even before he joined The
Agency, and while knowing that this was not the
sort of work that would sell, it was important that
he had time and space to develop and realise it.
Although not directly involved in the production
of this particular installation, The Agency was
supportive of Abdu’Allah’s relationship with
Chisenhale Gallery and with Autograph, The
Association of Black Photographers, who co-
produced the work.
Introducing Abdu’Allah and the other artists
she represents to a variety of curators and writers
is an important aspect of de Souza’s role as
gallerist, as well as ensuring that their work is
seen by an array of collectors and represented at
international art fairs such as those in Cologne
and Basel. Abdu’Allah has had a number of solo
shows at The Agency itself, with the next one in
Spring 2004, and has participated in group shows
at the gallery with other Agency artists. Socialising
and networking, with The Agency acting as a hub
for making contacts and links, is a valuable aspect
of the relationship between artist and gallery, and
de Souza encourages the artists she represents
to give advice and support to one another.
Faisal Abdu’Allah, Grace,
Screenprint on copper and
stone, 50x50cm, 2000. Private
collection, USA.
Faisal Abdu’Allah, The Garden
of Eden, Installation, 2003.
COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
Abdu’Allah’s profile, both nationally and
internationally, has certainly been raised since
being represented by de Souza, and he feels that
people treat him differently now and are more
careful in the way they approach him. The day-to-
day stresses of having to deal with, for example,
the transportation and insurance of works or the
distribution of slides and CVs have also of course
been removed, and with the validation that having
a gallerist bestows, his work commands a far
higher price than previously, with the profits from
any work sold being divided equally between
Abdu’Allah and the gallery.
For The Agency, representing artists such as
Abdu’Allah who are dealing with socially relevant
questions through strong, provocative work, and
maintaining an ethos in its selection of artists while
not professing an overt and singular political
agenda, has been influential. Ken Lum, an already
well-established artist, asked to join the gallery
because he felt an affinity with its approach.
On being asked whether having a gallerist has
changed the way he thinks about his practice,
Abdu’Allah said that it has, in that he has become
more self conscious and aware of the implications
that his work might have. He is wary however of
becoming too analytical about his process and
wants to regain in some way what he sees as the
immediacy and spirituality of some of his earlier
work. A commitment to dialogue, maintaining a
space to talk, whether with de Souza in the gallery
or with his clients as he cuts their hair in his
barber’s shop, remains central to Abdu’Allah’s
practice.
Rohini Malik Okon is undertaking a PhD in the Visual
Cultures Department at Goldsmiths College, where
she is also co-ordinator of the research project:
‘Translating the Image: Cross Cultural Contemporary
Arts’. She is a writer and printmaker.
Contact:
Faisal Abdu’Allah
faisal@fabdullah.fsnet.co.uk
The Agency Contemporary
18 Charlotte Road, London EC2A 3PB
First published: a-n Magazine January 2004
TIME TO THINK AND SPACE TO TALK 11
Eating grass
Edith-Marie Pasquier talks to inIVA Director
Gilane Tawadros and artist Alia Syed about
their experience of working together.
“I was thirty minutes late as I couldn’t find inIVA’s
offices in Rivington Street and I arrived disgruntled
clutching a plastic bag full of films”, laughs Alia
Syed remembering her first meeting with Gilane
Tawadros, Director of inIVA. “It must have been the
films that saved me. Steve McQueen, a friend of
mine, suggested I showed them my work, as I was
looking for new audiences and the gallery seemed
an interesting space away from cinema”. Within ten
months inIVA (Institute of International Visual Arts)
was producing Syed’s first solo touring exhibition,
‘Jigar’, derived from the Urdu word for ‘friend’ or
‘lover’, bringing together work made over the past
fifteen years and leading to a collaboration with the
organisation that was to last a further two years,
culminating in the production of Syed’s new 16mm
film, Eating Grass. “On a personal level, Syed’s work
really resonated for me”, recalls Gilane Tawardros.
“I think most striking of all, apart from the work
holding the ability to be amazed and carrying a
distinctive and powerful voice, it came from
someone who knew how to make films, I see so
much work and when someone knows how to use
their medium, that comes across.”
Alia Syed’s short 16mm poetic films reveal a
process that balances her attention to formal detail
whilst exploring ideas central to her oeuvre;
creating a synthesis of abstract images, spoken and
written narratives ambiguous in their comment on
desire, memory, place, myth, translation and
cultural identity – specifically some of her films
focus on the Pakastani and Bangladeshi
communities of east London – in a dialogue that is
open, evolving and seductive. Whilst Syed is an
accomplished experimental filmmaker, having
shown nationally and internationally on the film
circuit, she believes that her collaboration with
inIVA was in part successful because of the context
that inIVA developed to show her work. “I do
actually like the context which inIVA have created
for my work – in particular the political context.
The organisation is interested in a notion of a
culture that goes beyond art and the limitations of
race and at the same time addresses the difficulties
for people who make work who are not from the
dominant ideology or those who produce work that
cannot fall into easy categories.”
Gilane Tawadros is candid in stressing the
importance of content and form when choosing an
artist to work with inIVA but ultimately any final
decision will be dictated by programming
considerations. “Because of the way inIVA works we
do invite artists to come and see us – we do see lots
of artists and obviously, we are not in the position
to give opportunities to all artists, no institution
can. Whilst the work can be very powerful, we have
to provide a context for that work. Some of that is
luck and timing and there is no getting away from
that. It was obvious from Syed’s work that she knew
how to make the medium of film deliver the
content, plus the content was very good. We were
looking at her work in parallel to thinking about a
season called Jubilee in which we wanted to present
solo shows and a whole range of work. We were
thinking of the Queen’s jubilee and how inIVA as an
organisation has been engaged with Britishness.”
12 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
Syed’s work is akin to inIVA’s vision of exploring
Britishness and the mainstream and how difference
can impact or shake up what constitutes this
relationship, creating a catalyst for change.
Importantly, for Tawadros, her films articulated a
space, that is now being ignored by artists. “We are
very conscious that people seem to think identity
is no longer an issue. In part this is because some
very visible figures such as Chris Ofili, Steve
McQueen, Issac Julien and Mona Hatoum have
looked at identity so that artists now believe there
is no more to be said. Syed’s work is mature, it is
about the impossibility of a coherent narrative.
We had great discussions about how you express
different cultural perspectives coming together,
how you articulate the experience of living across
more than one space simultaneously but without
reducing this by being too literal, simplifying the
experience or celebrating it in a crass way.”
In February 2002, ‘Jigar’ toured with
consecutive screenings at inIVA and The New Art
Gallery in Walsall and later at The Turnpike Gallery,
Leigh. At inIVA two films were shown; a single
screen version of Spoken Diary and Fatima’s Letter,
filmed at Whitechapel tube station, told in Urdu
with deliberately out-of-sync English subtitles, Alia Syed, Fatima's Letter,
black and white still from
questions notions of documentary truth. Gilane 16mm film, 1994.
Tawadros explains the importance of these
consecutive screenings: “We showed Fatima’s Letter
here for obvious reasons because we thought the
work had resonances for this particular part of
London and one of the reasons inIVA exists is to
show work that reflects experiences you can’t find
elsewhere.”
When installing the show in Walsall other
narratives were developed with the three films –
Swan, The Watershed and Spoken Diary – arranged
as separate installations that overlapped and
interrelated to create a single piece of work. Syed
developed a physical journey through the work that
was further textualised by showing Swan on 16mm
projection, The Watershed and Spoken Diary on
DVD (although shot on 16mm film then transferred
to DVD the film image became removed from the
physicality of projection), creating en route a
deliberate mediation between the works. The shift
in focus away from the cinema to the gallery space
was an important part of the creative dialogue as
Tawadros explains, “Syed had only been shown in a
film context, it was quite new for her to be thinking
about showing in a visual arts base. So part of our
discussions was about what that means and how
that affects the work that is seen. I felt that a
contemporary art context would make her work
accessible to a much wider audience and I think her
work lends itself to be shown within that context. Alia Syed, Swan, black and
It is non-linear, reasonably short and it invites you white still from 16mm film,
1989.
to enter textually, as well as into its context without
a clear beginning, middle and end.”
Seemingly, that is where the collaboration
would end – at the last date of the touring show.
Yet, Tawadros had further designs, which were not
immediately realised in the timescale: “The original
ambition for the project was greater – we wanted to
do a monograph and we also wanted to help Syed
make new work, but could not raise the money in

Alia Syed, Eating Grass, film
still, 2003. Courtesy: The artist
and Talwar Gallery, New York
time. It is important for me that a relationship with
an artist is more than a one off. Whilst I think it is
so important showing existing work in a new
context and making it accessible for new audiences,
giving the artists the opportunity to make new
work is equally as important – there are not enough
opportunities out there and there are not enough
people enabling new work.” Syed, building on the
success of her touring show and previous
relationships with film institutions, made an
application to the London Film and Video
Development Agency for an Artists’ Film & Video
Award for £20,000 to make a new 16mm film,
Eating Grass.
Her application was successful and she choose
inIVA as producers for the film. “I also worked with
my sister Tanya Syed who makes films and could
support the production element, but inIVA
facilitated the whole process and were very
supportive. I could speak to who ever I wanted and
that was very helpful. It took me eighteen months
to make the film, although I was supposed to make
it in one year. I never make my work quickly so
when Gilane Tawadros gave me a horrendous
deadline to have the film finished by the time of F-
EST in October 2002 I thought I was never going to
make it.”
“Eating Grass, is based on times of prayer and is
in English and Urdu with subtitles and filmed in
Pakistan and London. I have a relationship to
Pakistan which goes back to when I was six-months
old. Noski Deville was to be my cinematographer.
We established how we were going to work
technically with timelapse – a technique which was
relatively new to both of us – in London (Deville has
worked with Issac Julien and Steve McQueen
amongst others), but because of the greater global
situation it was not possible for her to come. I also
felt it would be more appropriate to work with
people from Pakistan.” Syed’s eyes dart back to that
moment as she confirms that despite her fears she
met the deadline: “I don’t know to what extent
Gilane Tawadros understood how much work I
needed to do to get the film finished or she
understood very well how much work I needed to
do and she just wanted to give me a push. But
whatever the reason it was very good and I am
grateful because inIVA did help me raise money
from London Arts and with that extra £5,000 it
ensured that I could pay people to get it finished in
time.” Syed is happy to concede, “My whole
COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
relationship with inIVA gave me confidence. The
gallery has informed my process. Although I knew
Eating Grass was going to be premiered in a gallery
I did not make any concessions because of this. As
a film it sits slightly uneasily in this space – its
actual duration is twenty-three minutes but its
emotional timescale is much longer. The gallery
reflects this emotional space better, in isolation,
it references other work, notions of boundaries
between cinema and gallery are explored. I am
interested in working in the gallery – extending my
experience of using timelapse and revealing how
light travels across a frame, taking still
photographs over the passing of time with a
sequence of photographic images.”
Gilane Tawadros draws upon another less
apparent aspect of their collaboration. “Syed had to
think about the commodification of her work, when
inIVA shows work and in Syed’s instance the Talwar
Gallery – a commercial gallery in New York – gets
involved, that is an important step. It is good for
artists to have gallerists who can support them in
ways that institutions cannot. Artists need to exist
in a pluralist economy. I believe Syed’s work should
be in collections and not just with private buyers,
but in public collections, that is what I think inIVA
should be ensuring. Whilst we offer an artist a fee,
in terms of their livelihood artist fees are not
enough.
“One of the things that has, for me, been
marked over recent years is that it is actually
difficult for us to find partners to present work”,
comments Tawadros. “Because venues are under
such pressure to fundraise, to develop their press
profile and get people through the door, they are
more wary than ever before of showing artists who
are not known or established. Also, people shy
away from work that they see as political and that
has always been an issue for us. We work, at times
with politically sensitive ideas and that can be
politics with a small ‘p’ where the resonance is
beyond the cultural, artistic world. Gilane Tawadros
believes that a permanent site for inIVA will come
some way in addressing the problem (the
organisation is ten years old): “inIVA and Autograph
want to create, by 2007, a space that allows for the
continuous showing of work, a place that is an
identifiable venue for ongoing conversations, a
gateway for international contemporary art
practice, ideas and photography. We actually have
no permanent stake in this city, in this country and
a permanent presence would develop our capacity
to generate more money for programmes and give
us leverage in partnership to work with the big
institutions such as Tate and the Hayward Gallery.”
Tawadros’ focus is clear; to develop a continuous
and open dialogue with both artists and audience:
“It’s crazy just to have a one-off relationship with
an artist. I continuously learn from them. I think
artists bring a lot to an organisation and if you give
that relationship space and time, I do have a very
strong conviction that artists are the soundings for
a wider culture within society, a wider cultural
consciousness”.
Edith-Marie Pasquier is an artist and writer.
Contact:
inIVA
www.iniva.org
First published: a-n Magazine March 2004
EATING GRASS 13
Gold rush
Projects and collaborations rarely spring into existence fully formed.
Hilary Williams examines a short project that developed into a major
programme, led to the setting up of a new arts business, and to jeweller
Mah Rana uncovering new tracts of material and experience.
The origins of the HAT (Here and There) project
began in 2001 when Barney Hare Duke (then of
North West Arts) was approached by OBJECT (The
Centre for Craft and Design, Sydney, Australia) an
organisation keen to work with artists in the UK.
Within the contemporary crafts and design scene,
the North West of England was perceived to have
both an energy and considerable talent base. At the
same time, North West Arts was aware of the need
to extend the profile of artists, within its region,
onto an international stage and promote the
vibrancy of the region. This coincidence of strategy
and opportunity resulted in the Make Me project,
and a positive response from both sides of the
globe resulted in a desire to continue to develop
the network. In 2002 the HAT project was
formulated.
By this point Hare Duke had been seconded by
the Arts Council of England to develop the project
and he invited Jeremy Theophilus (ex-Senior Visual
Arts Officer, Arts Council of England) and Linda
Theophilus (ex-Director of Exhibitions and
Collection, Crafts Council) to become involved. With
their combined knowledge of the crafts and design
infrastructure, as well as a wealth of contacts
nationally and internationally, they were perfectly
placed to develop a strong curatorial project hand-
in-hand with supporting and nurturing all of the
artists involved. The primary objective was to
develop research opportunities in an international
context, which presented a rare chance for designer-
makers to extend their practice.
Three other regional arts boards became
involved – East Midlands Arts, West Midlands Arts
and the South East Arts. These partners began
working collaboratively with five states in Australia
to develop a project that would involve British
jewellers travelling to Australia to be in-residence
for a period of two to three months in artists
studios and educational establishments. Similarly,
Australian jewellers would have residencies in the
UK. Lists of the artists were submitted to the hosts
to place artists in the most suitable institution to
ensure that both host and artists gained the
maximum benefit from the exchange. As Hare Duke
explains, “the hopes for the project were that it
would assert the value of research in practice and
that it would be an articulation of experience.”
It was also proposed that an exhibition should
be held at the end of the residencies. A curatorial
decision was taken that the artists were not
required to show finished work, but rather the
exhibition was as a way to reveal the evidence of
process, and seventeen individual approaches to
making. Mah Rana, one of the jewellers from the UK
who spent two months in Monash University,
Melbourne presented the list of films she had seen,
and books that she had read during her residency,
feeling that the thought processes behind her work
were revealed much more in her viewing and
reading during the period.
The exhibition has just finished a tour of the
UK, visiting five venues linked to the sites of the
14 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
residency hosts and to the regions where the HAT
jewellers lived, and is poised to tour Australia.
Initial feedback about the show has been positive,
with venues reporting that visitors are staying
longer to study and unpick the individual creative
journeys represented.
Rana had visited Perth in Australia informally in
2001 with a friend who was to undertake a
residency. Fascinated by the city, she was keen to
return to Australia in order to explore other cities
to see how they might vary from her initial
impression of the country. With her work often
executed in gold she decided she wanted to explore
the history of the metal in relation to the Australian
gold rush and how this, in some instances, has
shaped the social, economic as well as actual
landscape of Melbourne. Much of Rana’s work
explores the resonance that a piece of jewellery
might carry for the owner or the wearer (as part of
the touring HAT exhibition she has interviewed
visitors about their own jewellery and
photographed them wearing it) and the possibility
of exploring the actual material would add to the
cultural context of her work.
With her proposal accepted and her teaching
timetable taken into consideration Rana began
her residency in the Jewellery and Metalwork
Department of Monash University, Melbourne.
She had a flat on campus and bench space in the
MA studio, and an individual agreement with the
department also resulted in a fee for materials.
Non prescriptive in its requirements of the artist-
in-residence, Rana was adamant that while she
gained from the experience the organisation
should also benefit from her time and she gave a
series of lectures and weekend workshops.
In conversation Rana freely admits that “I didn’t
follow the proposal word for word, but using this
as a starting point I was allowed so much creative
freedom”. Rana visited the Sovereign Hill Theme
Park in Melbourne (site of one of the gold rushes in
the nineteenth century) and from this point
explored the city of Melbourne. Travelling little
outside the city she became fascinated in the
‘familiar Australia’ – the identical place names to
her London home, the travel companies and estate
agents with the same names and logos, the
supermarkets stocked with the same food stuffs –
it was the ephemeral, the incidental that she started
to document. Working more in her campus flat with
her computer and Photoshop than at her bench, she
watched films and read, and with this distance from
making she became more aware of her own creative
process: “My work explores the relationship
between people and places, it’s like storytelling, the
narrative of a film.”
Only with this time to step away from the usual
commitments back in the UK does Rana feel that
she has had time to reassess her reasons for
making. Other benefits of the residency included an
informal network of students, practitioners and
curators – a social network – who accompanied her
to the cinema and exhibition openings. In the long-
 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS

term she feels that when she is able to go back,

connections and opportunities are in place to
pursue. This positive link to Melbourne has
resulted in a confidence to consider working in
other areas of Australia.
When the seventeen residencies were completed
the artists (including Cynthia Cousens, Claire
Norcross, Junko Mori and Vannetta Seecharran) and
the project team met in Manchester for a week long
residential conference to talk through the project,
exchange views and ideas and to see, in terms of
research, the individual outcomes. This creative
exchange was documented by the eighteenth artist-
in-residence, the documentary photographer and
film maker Johnny Magee whose images are already
illustrate the project website and are included in
the publication that accompanies the project.
Talking to Rana it appears that the project was
an extremely positive step for her. Well organised
and thought through, the outcome for the artist
seems to have been considered and centrally placed
at the beginning of this organically developed
project – where the creative path and process are
regarded and valued as central in nurturing the
development of practitioners. HAT has helped
establish a model for future artistic exchanges –
with Barney Hare Duke and Jeremy Theophilus
having formed A Fine Line, a company that aims to
establish international opportunities for designer
makers. With projects already in the planning for
further exchanges to Australia, and extending to
India, Pakistan, China and Japan it seems that the
HAT project has proved itself to be a more than
suitable framework on which to build. This model
may aid the creative journeys (in both the literal
and non literal sense) of many more practitioners
from the UK in exploring varying cultural contexts
for their work, and also adds to the artistic
infrastructure of the UK by the reciprocal visits
of artists from around the world.

Hilary Williams is the Director of Ditchling Museum.

Contact:
www.mahrana.com

More information about HAT and contact details can be found at

All images: www.hat.mmu.ac.uk

Mah Rana, Little Differences,

First published: a-n Magazine December 2004
May-June 2003. Series of
photographs taken during
residency at Monash university,
Melbourne.

GOLD RUSH 15
Old and new masters
Bruce Haines profiles Johannes Phokela’s ongoing
partnership with Gasworks in London.
Johannes Phokela and Gasworks is one of the
longer standing partnerships to have weathered
the vagaries of the art world. For over ten years
Gasworks Studios has provided Phokela with a
stable, affordable workspace, augmented by an
international visiting artists’ programme and,
of late, a changing exhibition programme in the
galleries below. The building, situated near the
Oval cricket ground, now houses thirteen studios
and a gallery; ten studios are rented out to
London-based artists while three are reserved for
the International Residency Programme, where
artists are invited to take a studio for a period
of up to three months.
Throughout his tenure, Phokela has made his
mark both in the UK and internationally through his
unique takes on Dutch and Flemish ‘Old Masters’,
among others, sending up their aesthetics and
cultural specificity with breathtaking audacity and
great technical facility. Phokela’s beautifully
painted versions of iconic images by the likes of
Bruegel, Rubens, de Gheyn and Jordaens are
worked up deliberately from reproductions and
his memory of the original. He changes the gender
and colour of key protagonists from their North
European origins to make deeply unsettling
images that challenge nationalistic narratives
around art history. In a painting from Jordaen’s
The King Drinks, Phokela depicts a Flemish family
group gorging on a feast; with lascivious and
cannibalistic tendencies. He focuses on the abject
aspects of the original; food, vomit and excrement
particularly coming to the fore. Phokela studied at
the Royal College of Art, London. His South
African roots and move to the UK are linked to
these reinterpretations of the Golden Age in line
with the African continent. His paintings are as
much about the violent and twisted history of
Europeans in Africa as they are about the history
of painting. Phokela’s extensive knowledge of the
subject is, though, underpinned by a great sense
of humour which he brings to a familiar, but often
misunderstood genre.
Gasworks started in 1994 as an artist-run
space, based on the Bag Factory, an artists’ studio
and gallery complex established in Johannesburg
four years earlier. Artists were involved in
programming and running the gallery and the
residency programme. This created a strong sense
of community and mutual support both for local
and the visiting artists. Both are part of Triangle
Arts Trust, a network of artists and organisations
initiated in 1982 by Robert Loder and Anthony
Caro. Here, over a two-week period, between
twenty and twenty-five artists were invited to
develop works benefiting from contact and
dialogue with their peers. About half of the
workshop participants were from the country
where the workshop took place while the others
were from other international countries. At the
heart of Gasworks is a commitment to fostering
collaboration from working alongside other
artists. This has provided an alternative way of
what Alessio Antoniolli, who runs the residency
programme, calls “learning by exchange, a way
16 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
of reflecting on one’s own practice through the
process of art making and dialogue with others”.
Over twenty workshops are currently active in
countries as diverse as Venezuela, Ghana, South
Africa, India, China, Australia and the UK. These
locations form what is known as the Triangle
Network.
For Phokela, being a Gasworks artist is a
privilege, especially since the studios are not run
on a commercial or business basis, at least from
his perspective:
“The benefits of working in an environment
containing short-term guests artists from overseas,
plus a project-orientated gallery space, outweighs
most conventional studio places. I have been able
to focus my work, as well as use the opportunity
to build connections with people from numerous
parts of the world involved in the arts.”
For the first four or five years at Gasworks,
artists programmed an incredible number of
residencies and exhibitions, more than twenty
shows each year. The gallery provided emerging
and international artists with an opportunity to
exhibit in London. With time the heavier
Johannes Phokela,
professional commitments on artists/organisers Saycheese, oil on canvas,
have made it more and more difficult to deliver a 168x198cm, 2002.
programme without having to sacrifice other areas
of their practice. In 1998 Gasworks applied to
Johannes Phokela,
Lottery funding and the following year the gallery Apotheosis, oil on canvas
applied to be supported by London Arts (now (arched Stretcher), 2004.
known as Arts Council England, London) for
revenue funding as a small-scale gallery. Both bids
were successful and enabled Gasworks to employ
a residency coordinator and a gallery director.
While the aim of Gasworks is to curatorially
and administratively support the professional
development of artists at earlier stages of their
career, for Phokela the promotion of himself
comes second to the diverse benefits that the
workshops and residencies brings. Although as an
artist-run space Gasworks was showing all artists
who had a studio, now that the programme is
curated it is not necessarily the case, though this
has just happened in the case of Saki Satom.
Having a studio at Gasworks leaves Phokela
relatively less stressed out from the ups and
downs associated with creative practice.
As a publicly funded organisation, Alessio
Antoniolli confirms the pastoral role the transition
from artist led organisation to an artist supporting
institution has brought:
“We feel a responsibility as well as a pleasure
in developing a programme that gives visibility
to studio and visiting artists through a series of
activities ranging from talks and seminars to
workshops and other education activities.”
From Gasworks point of view, the support it
gives to artists is reciprocated by the time and
energy the permanently based artists give back.
Phokela for instance has been very involved in
suggesting artists and introducing curators to
Gasworks. Recently Gasworks has introduced
a two-year contract for ‘permanent’ artists. In the
past artists were freer to stay longer but it was
decided that a more frequent turnover benefits
 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS

the life of the studio and helps to keep the place

more dynamic.
Perhaps as just recognition for Phokela’s
dedication and unwavering practice, he was
awarded a coveted decibel artists’ award this year,
which he describes as “more than a grant in a
meritocratic sense”, and now is in a much stronger
position to realise his objectives. Johannes Phokela
and Robert Loder go a long way back, with many
mutual friends, a relationship that is a suitable
metaphor for the generosity that lies at the heart
of the organisation and which will ensure it
continues to go from strength to strength.
It seems vital to Phokela’s ongoing
productivity for him to maintain a position within
the community that Gasworks fosters, and which
mutual support should ensure that neither party
stands still for long.

Bruce Haines is a curator and writer.

Contact:
Gasworks
155 Vauxhall Street, London SE11 5RH
www.gasworks.org.uk

Phokela’s work can also be viewed on the inIVA website:

www.iniva.org/archive/person/203

First published: a-n Magazine April 2005

OLD AND NEW MASTERS 17

Cross-pollination
Ben Coode-Adams talks to Rob Kesseler and NESTA
about their symbiotic relationship.
The partnership between the National Endowment
for Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA) and
artist Rob Kesseler seeks to reawaken the fertile
confluence between the botanical sciences and the
decorative and fine arts. Awarded the fellowship to
provide him with time, materials and equipment,
Kesseler says “It’s a wonderful opportunity to
encourage visual awareness of a fascinating, yet
still untapped area of scientific research”. As ‘NESTA
Fellow at the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew’ the
partnership provides him with a grant of £75,000
over three years.
Kesseler is embedded in two institutions; NESTA
and the Royal Botanical Gardens Kew. Although
each has very different attitudes and goals, they are
united behind the impetus to raise ‘public
awareness of science’. This may sound trite, even
naive, but in this case it is not just lip service, but a
genuine motivation. The frequency and quality of
the ways in which Kesseler’s work has reached the
public testifies to its integrity.
Like many artists, Kesseler is a natural jack-of-
all-trades and master of many, expecting to fund
and make work, organise exhibitions and
publications and generate publicity as well as
continuing to teach. The fellowship has put him in
the position of being asked to undertake projects
rather than to have to initiate them, meaning that
administrative functions have passed to others,
enabling him to delegate responsibilities such as
publicity.
However, the fellowship programme does not
have an open application. Applicants are invited to
apply by anonymous scouts who scour the country
looking for suitable and worthy candidates. The
scouts are acknowledged experts in their fields, and
this allows NESTA to move into unfamiliar territory
in which they have not worked before.
NESTA likes to work in the gaps between other
funders, supporting collaborative and cross- or
multi-disciplinary projects and teams. It seeks out
new arenas in which to work. It seeks out the
innovative, cutting edges of disciplines; learning all
the time, developing organically in response to its
experiences with projects and practitioners. In
some senses the fellows have shaped the way
NESTA has evolved.
Right from the start NESTA makes a
collaborative proposition of the relationship
between institution and fellow. The organisation
does not want to have creative input, but for the
applicant to be able to push their ideas into reality,
maximise the potential of the project and ensure
that its impact is as wide as possible, ‘NESTA
connects public money with brilliant individuals’.
Given the enormous breadth of the areas in
which NESTA works, there can be no model for how
each project pans out or how it is supported. Each
project and fellowship is taken on its own terms,
and support is tailored.
NESTA appoint a member of staff who will guide
the applicant through the application process and
represent the applicant at the crucial trustees
meeting when proposals are judged. This is not
nannying, but time for NESTA to get to know the
18 COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
applicant. Indeed NESTA fellows are characterised
by their independence of mind and self-sufficiency.
By chance, Kesseler went through two other
members of staff before ending up with Alex
Barclay, his main contact. Just as NESTA is not the
average funder, it is not the average employer.
Disney was Barclay’s previous boss, followed by a
holding company for which he managed five media
and creative companies. Barclay describes NESTA as
“an incredible place to work. You’re learning all the
time. You have to be highly flexible. It is really
satisfying. Management of these projects is
controlled improvisation”.
On 5 September 2003, Kesseler showed every
single member of NESTA’s staff around Kew
Gardens. Barclay described the day: “Rob is a
fantastic verbal as well as visual communicator.
He enhanced our understanding of the natural
world. It was great to go from the abstract world of
applications to the very concrete world of his work
at Kew, to see how our work impacts on the real
world.”
Kesseler had never heard of NESTA when he was
asked to apply for a fellowship, and the application
process was gruelling. It took him six months to
complete and then he almost failed to win the
support of the trustees, who make the final
decisions, because the peer review process was not
entirely positive. By his own admission, his
proposal sounded dull. At the eleventh hour, the
intervention of the scout, who picked him out,
reinvigorated his optimism in his application.
He was awarded the application on his track record
but also on his detailed research and profound
knowledge of his subject area. Kesseler really loves
plants. NESTA did not know how the fellowship
would pan out but they welcome risk and are Rob Kesseler, poppy, original
magnification x3k, 380x380cm.
committed to innovation.
Barclay has noticed a close alliance between the Rob Kesseler, hawkweed,
original magnification x2k,
cutting edge of disciplines and cutting edge 100x200cm.
technology. Accessible and developing technology
enables creative people to be ‘niche-switchers’. Rob Kesseler, mayweed
pollen, original magnification
Technology is often the engine of collaborative x4k, 420x420cm.
relationships. While Kesseler is not attempting to
niche-hop, technology has been indispensable in
allowing him to get really close to his subject
through Kew’s array of electron microscopes.
These microscopes have been the locale of his
collaboration with Kew Gardens.
Being a fellow is no cakewalk. It piles on the
pressure by widening the possibilities. But with
that comes responsibility. Suddenly you are
answerable to someone who is constantly asking
“How is the public benefiting from this?” NESTA is
dealing with public money and taxpayers must
benefit from its awards. The fellowship raises the
stakes, and with it the stress. It is not for artists
who want a quiet life.
The fellow must position him/herself so that
when the fellowship ends there is no nosedive into
obscurity having just reached a career summit.
One of Barclay’s main functions has been to help
Kesseler think strategically, to plan his workload so
he still has space to be creative. They have begun
to plan an exit strategy. Barclay asks all the fellows

he manages to plan up to fifteen years ahead.
One of Kesseler’s principal gifts is for creating
the right environment for chance encounters to
spark beneficial opportunities. The exploitation of
such opportunities has been key to the success of
his fellowship. Kesseler is well networked in his
own right, despite describing himself as “not
clubbable”, but teamed with NESTA’s Strategy
Communications and PR Department his ability to
create environments conducive to propagating
opportunities is formidable.
Perhaps the best example of Kesseler creating
fertile ground for opportunities is the story of how
he was nominated for a fellowship in the first place.
A NESTA scout stumbled across him by chance.
Grizedale Arts was developing a craft-based strand
to its programme of residencies. Richard Slee and
Kesseler were the first beneficiaries of this. Funded
by Grizedale and Central St Martin’s, where he
studied and now teaches, with assistance from
Josiah Wedgwood and Sons Ltd and The Ruskin
Library, Lancaster University, Kesseler developed a
project based around the idea of having dinner with
Rob Kesseler, corncockle,
installation view. Photo: the
artist. The banners carry
digitally manipulated images
of wildflower pollen
photographed on a scanning
electron microscope and are
sited adjacent to the site from
which the pollen was collected
last year. The images are
printed onto vinyl mesh.
Rob Kesseler, Gathered, a
dinner held in Grizedale
Forest, 2000. Photo: Claire
Shoosmith. Kesseler hosted a
dinner using a specially
created dinner service
decorated with images of
pollen collected from the
forest.
COLLECTIONS: COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS
Ruskin and tea with Wordsworth. He began to
collect the pollen of Lakeland flora and contacted
Dr Madeline Harley, a scientist from Kew Gardens’
Micromorphology Unit. She is an expert on pollen
and now Kesseler’s long-term collaborator with
whom he plans a book.
Kesseler applied the images generated to a
120-piece dinner service. The project combined
the observations of John Ruskin and Dorothy and
William Wordsworth with images from a Scanning
Electron Microscope. This work culminated in a
dinner in the forest using the dinner service. He
happened, unknowingly, to invite a NESTA scout.
The event, on an unseasonably warm September
evening in 2000, was a magical combination of
Ruskin, excellent food (and wine) and swarms of
midges. It convinced the scout, a Ruskin scholar,
to ask Kesseler to make an application for the
fellowship programme.
For Kesseler, his work at Grizedale raised more
questions than answers and he was keen to
continue to exploit the productive subjects he had
combined. He began work on installations at Dove
Cottage, the former home of Wordsworth in
Grasmere and later at the Victoria & Albert Museum
in spring 2001. The NESTA application was
therefore opportune but it did not divert the flow
of his work, indeed it supported it.
Kesseler is funded to make the work he wants
to make. His profile and credibility is raised, giving
him opportunities to work in the public domain
with permanent and temporary works that might
otherwise have passed him by.
He is currently working on a complex and
extensive installation for Sustrans (the National
Cycle Network) on the route between Folkestone
and Dover called Flora Calcarea. His work was
featured at Kew as part of the ‘Go wild’ festival this
summer.
Ben Coode-Adams is an artist. His work spans
sculpture, video installation, photography,
performance and curation. Working across disciplines,
collaboration is a cornerstone of his work.
www.bencoodeadams.com
Contact:
NESTA
www.nesta.org.uk.
Grizedale Arts
www.grizedale.org
Rob Kesseler
www.graft-uk.com/studies.html
First published: a-n Magazine October 2003
CROSS-POLLINATION 19
To mark our 25th year we’re bringing out some new publications that focus on
the key issues for artists and their practice, provide contexts for discourse
and debate and support good practice in the visual arts.

FUTURE FORECAST GOOD PRACTICE

Entitled Future space (May), Social space (August), Curated Extending applications of The Code
space (November) and Outer space (February), this series is of Practice for the Visual Arts by
about raising questions, not giving answers, on the pros and demonstrating good practice in valuing
cons of future support frameworks and expectations for artists. and paying artists, the Artists’ Fees and
Payments series includes: Establishing
a-n COLLECTIONS a charge rate for a working artist;
Designed to examine and analyse the ‘why, what and how’ of Good practice in paying artists,
artists’ practice. Includes anthologies of selected articles from aimed at public sector arts employers
the a-n archive contextualised by new commentary, such as commissioners, consultants and trainers;
Collaborative relationships with Rohini Malik Okon (June), and the forthcoming Good Exhibition
and new themed texts selected by guest editors John Beagles Practice (September).
and Paul Stone (July) and Deborah Smith (October).

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