THE

INDEPENDENT ART SCHOOL
LECTURER PROFILES

 

Becky Shaw

Consultant in Serving the Agendas of Others

Personal profile:

Becky Shaw has been negotiating commission and residency contracts for ten years, becoming increasingly interested in the ways artists find to hold onto autonomy at the same time as being in a position of serving the agenda of an employer. This negotiation between principles and the demands of an employer or social context is not unique to artists, being particularly
apparent in any employment where the potential for change is balanced with the requirements (and maintenance) of vested interests, as in planning, education and medicine etc. However, as artists can both be in this relationship and articulate it at the same time, they are perhaps in a unique position to communicate this dilemma and to propose, through practice, ways that space can always be made to negotiate the space of both a formal contract and the intangible social contract.

 
Becky has always developed work with a process or method in mind, rather than an outcome, believing that art is inherently a process of research in communication. A practical and theoretical doctorate in 1998, explored the significance of collaborative art practice for palliative care patients. This used predominantly sculpture, but following this less concrete methods have been used including text, photography, spatial re-arrangement and live work. In addition to work made under an individual identity, Becky is co-director of Static, Liverpool, with architect Paul Sullivan. Static is dedicated to critical activity, experimenting with new ways to explore relationships between individuals and institutions, or power structures. For example, in 2003 Static instigated EXIT REVIEW, commissioning two reviews of the degree shows of every graduating fine art student in Liverpool. While this was intended to provide feedback to students it also explored the relationship between Liverpool art and educational institutions, the movement between education to 'real world' for students, the purpose of art education and also the importance of criticism and its power as a tool of emancipation or domination. EXIT REVIEW will be revisited in a different form next year. For 2004 Static has instigated 'Press Corps', a response to the Liverpool Biennial.

Recent projects by Becky include 'Civics: The Science of Citizenship' for Futurology at New Art Gallery Walsall. 'Civics' explores the relationships between planning and urban regeneration, government use of education to carry out social agendas, such as citizenship, the use of artists to serve social inclusion, and the reality of life in a school. Becky followed a
team of school leavers for one day, as they were employed by their own school as a removal team. During one day a photograph was taken every minute, as a way to reflect on the use of the young men's time. The 343 slides are presented within a live lecture. This work builds on 'Reception', made in response to a residency in the department of Social and Policy Sciences, University of Bath. In an attempt to question the role of an artist in residence and how artists are employed to represent the interests of both themselves and others, Becky turned a foyer space into a reception to the artist in residence, where she then worked as receptionist to the artist in residence. 'Reception' seeks to articulate the problem that both academics and artists have, of wanting to be immersed in the processes of research and learning, but needing to evidence their work to the institution.

Work contexts continue to be of great interest. In 2002/3 Becky developed 'The Manufacture of Ultramarine Blue' for Grizedale Arts. She recreated a local, closed ultramarine factory by inititating a cycle of productivity which, in fitting with the lake district's tourist economy, used the labour of leisure painters, to make paintings of blue objects acquired at a local car boot sale. The paintings were judged by ex-blue factory workers then 're-pixellated' into jigsaws and returned to the car boot sale. This project followed 'Perpetual Motion' which harnessed the energy of exercisers at Stratford Leisure Centre and used it to run a cappuccino machine in the upstairs gallery. Exercisers were sold their coffee at a reduced rate, drawing attention to the fact that they were being sold their own energy.

Following the PhD Becky has also continued to explore health contexts. In 2002 she won the Amstelveen Art Incentive prize and was commissioned to make a new work in a centre for people with severe physical disability. In the work produced, 'The Generosity Project' Becky chose to address why we expect artists to be benevolent providers of generous acts, and questioned the power relationship of being the giver, particularly in a context of disability. The negotiation between art as benevolent and critical force is also a central part of a new project, Transfer'. Rather than adding new art, Becky will respond to a commission to devise an art research project, by removing all the art from the Manchester Royal Infirmary site.

Dissemination of these live projects was always been a complex issue and Becky will shortly launch the Journal of Occasional Trade as a vehicle through which her projects can be communicated beyond the moment.