ALL at Guest Projects: Five Years Fundraiser

Luca Natali Stradivari

Art Language Location and Broken Grey Wires

Robert Good

Richard Allen

Al Coffey and friends

Lord Puffin
Luca Natali Stradivari
Lizz Brady
Kato Catling
Kenji Lim

Date - 14th December 2017
Venue - Guest Projects, London E8 4QL, UK

Next exhibition - PLACE: Relinking, Relating, Relaying at The Ruskin Gallery, Cambridge and elsewhere, 25 January – 17 February 2018

Robert Good

Robert Good brought the Art Language Location roadshow to the shores of Regents Canal in Shoreditch last week. After five years of running the innovative ALL festival in Cambridge it was an opportunity for a London art audience to see what he has achieved so far. It was a mere taste of what Art Language Location represents, despite the night lacking the all important locations (Cambridge) visitors to the exhibition/party were treated to a 45 minute set of live performances. 

Lord Puffin

Robert Good introduced the exhibition, which also doubled as a fundraiser (make a donation HERE). Matthew Wilson’s helium balloons floated centre stage, hanging above the performers like a Puff of Damocles. Cocktails and mulled wine tempted people to the wicked corners of the Guest Project space. Rosanna Greaves' compilation of ALL short videos lit up a wall alongside Amelia Critchlow's beautiful installation. There was a table-top sale and silent auction which helped raise more than £800 for the cause. Music was provided by Lord Puffin.

Al Coffey and friends

The performances were led by Richard Allen, who punctuated the intervals with his witty conceptual rhymes. Al Coffey and friends presented their clever on-the-move observations on Art, mixing the spirit of youth with a cerebral twist. Kenji Lim took us on a 'journey' of words. An old hand in the Art Language Location game, Lim was named the winner of the Art Language Location award in 2015 and his artwork 'Daughters' was displayed on the Anglia Ruskin University campus during the festival. 

Kato Catling

Kato Catling presented an intriguing poetic work as well as some vibrant postcards in the table-top sale. The longest and most hypnotic performance of the night came from Luca Natali Stradivari. His one man re-enactment exposed the story of a man slowly losing his mind. If any piece challenged the idea of Art Language Location then this was it. The Art wasn't of the clinical gallery kind, the Language was conveyed with hands and grunts, while the Location was unmistakeably Shoreditch but also embedded within the audience's imagination.

Luca Natali Stradivari

Art Language Location is a not-for-profit, collaborative organisation run by artists based in Cambridge UK. Their aim is to support artists and projects to bring innovative, exciting and experimental text-based art to unusual and interesting locations across Cambridge and beyond. ALL began with Text&Context in October 2012 and took the format of an art festival and symposium in Cambridge until 2016, featuring and connecting more than 150 artists with over 80 different locations through a series of exhibitions, festivals and one-off events.ALL is being reorganised during 2017 to move away from a festival approach and refocus on a range of Projects and collaborations.

Kenji Lim

Their next exhibition is PLACE: Relinking, Relating, Relaying (January 2018) exploring ideas of locality, identity and displacement. In the current climate of uncertainty, we will bring important and timely new perspectives and discourses to Cambridge, showing how art can cross borders to create new narratives and new connections.

Lizz Brady from Broken Grey Wires

Broken Grey Wires is a contemporary art organisation responding to and exploring mental health, philosophy, psychology and everything in between. They work closely with the community, critically acclaimed artists and major institutions, to open up a dialogue and provide inspiration and opportunities for people with mental health difficulties. Renowned psychiatrist R.D Laing proclaimed that “Madness need not be all breakdown. It may also be break-through.” This concept follows the ethos for Broken Grey Wires, creating a space for people to feel comfortable and participate in the project, for art to become a facilitator for recovery, and for Broken Grey Wires to encourage people to make something special for themselves.

Richard Allen