2008

Archive 2008

AGM December – to coincide with the closure of Liverpool 08 and the onset of the monster hangover of post08, an AGM took place in Dubrovnik, Croatia! This gave twoaddthree a chance to digest the very heavy Christmas cake ‘Viva Dissent’ whilst deciding what to do in 2009.

Autumn Interventions

We’ve been a little bit naughty at the Bluecoat Arts Centre in Liverpool for the Black Market for Useful Knowledge and Non-Knowledge. We were a bit worried that many artists and ‘experts’ were being appropriated by Liverpool 08. We staged a domestic argument, annoyed an expert next to us, Gary got on the table, Lena drank champagne and painted our banner with words: I MUST NOT INTERVENE IN LIVERPOOL 08.

I must not intervene in Liverpool 08. Photo by Peter Petralia

Video of the full event by Leon Seth.

Anfield tours of derelict houses around the fabulously wealthy Liverpool Football Club ground Anfield (the very cooperative, Andre Guedes and Francisco Malheiro) to the soundtrack of You’ll Never Walk Alone by local singer Geoff Caddick (on the cd player)

We publsihed our dissenting thoughts in MUTE, Future Visions of History and local grassroots magazine NERVE.

PLATFORM returned to talk about future collaboration, Nicola Kirkham came to hold the fort over the festive season and Malcolm Miles has written about the Institute in a forthcoming publication – watch this space for more.

DIY5: First Retreat then Advance!!

We completed DIY5: First Retreat then Advance!! 6 participants + 1 guest + twoaddthree.
DIY5: First Retreat then Advance!! took place in two stages over the two weekends: 11/12 Sep (Retreat) and 20/21 Sep (Advance). twoaddthree were joined by Abi Lake, Ange Taggart, Caroline Wilson, Lorena Rivero, Jane Trowell, Janice Harding and Steve Higginson. The project’s been supported by Live Art Development Agency. As a group, we collectively spent £500, mostly on feasting. In Retreat we discussed capitalistic subjectivity, went swimming, listened to presentations, walked to the highest and lowest points in Liverpool, experienced some pretentious culture, ate loads and drank some. In Advance we floated some paper boats, distributed ‘illegal’ leaflets, hid some letters, talked to the young and the old, ripped and hid some money, tagged some buildings, took a ferry across the Mersey, posted a message in a baby bottle, walked all the way to New Brighton, ate Fish and Chips and recollected. A full report and some additional documentation are available under DOCUMENTS.

A Key to UTOPIA

The Institute was pleased to be taking part in Salon Revolucije exhibition in Zagreb, Croatia. In correspondence, collaboration and with intellectual assistance from Antonija Majaca and Ivana Bago, twoaddthree have come up with A Key to UTOPIA: 68 keys of our humble house in Liverpool will be hanging on 68 nails spelling out Utopia. Audiences in Zagreb will be offered the possibility to take one and emigrate. Read more in our Propaganda Pamphlet ‘A Key to UTOPIA’ under DOCUMENTS.

Summer Performances

The Hazardous Family – as a part of HAZARD 08, outbreaks of hazardous behaviour and guerrilla live art, we investigated Engels’ collected works through political speeches and a family picnic at Parsonage Gardens and in front of Chetham’s Library, Manchester 12 July 2008, 1pm and 4pm.

The Hazardous Family was a performance intervention. This was an opportunity to investigate the construction of the family within present day consumer capitalism. This was a reading of Engels’ texts. This was a family picnic. This was a chance for us to make political speeches. This was the act of calling upon office workers. This was in red, green and white. This was an experiment in family activism. This was a family from Liverpool on a day-trip to Manchester.
‘The first division of labour is that between man and woman for the propagation of children.’
Marx & Engels

The Hazardous Family Propaganda Pamphlet and The Hazardous Family Performance Text are available to download from ARCHIVE DOCUMENTS.

Miss Julie in Utopia 2106200821 took place over the weekend of 20th and 21st June. This was a free event with limited capacity. This was history revisited! This was the Internationale sung! This was Strindberg undone!  A journey from 1888 via 1968 to 2008. Another wrld made possible. This was the revolution staged at home. This was Strindberg with a feminist make-over. This was about thinking class. This was about claiming history. This was about imagining Utopia.
16 audience members saw Preview on Friday and 15 audience members attended the Performance. Generic stew, red red wine and a revolutionary soundtrack followed afterwards. Performance text and Propaganda Pamphlet 2106200821 are available to download under DOCUMENTS.

SPRING ACTIONS

PLATFORM and Remember Saro-Wiwa lot occupied the space from 22nd to 26th April.

Photos by Martin LeSanto-Smith

PLATFORM were touring Remember Saro-Wiwa bus to Liverpool’s Albert Dock. Hope Collective from Liverpool Hope University joined them in their celebrations. For more information about their stay at the Institute, download ‘A Conversation with PLATFORM’ under DOCUMENTS.

Dan Simpkins and Penny Whitehead came for a ‘chat about thoughts of cultural dissent’. We did some DIY, tea, biscuits and wine. The Institute for the Art and Practice for Dissent at Home is now a part of a new artistic syndicate, established to raise questions about UK arts funding and to provide a structure in which alternative systems and approaches can be explored. We play lotto every Saturday! FANTASTIC!

Elaine Kordys and Di Clay were here for tea, some beer as well. We talked about kids and revolution. Helen Simpson visited us, brought a popcorn making machine and delighted us all. We talked about family matters, children, how popcorn works and what it might mean to be a feminist. We talked about class matters and struggled to define class sensibility – although we all seemed to like the term.

Gary and Lena presented The Institute for the Art and Practice of Dissent at Home in a research context – paper presentation at Liverpool Hope University, to be followed by one at INTERREGNUM: In Between States, PSi # 14 conference in Copenhagen 2008, August 20-24.

twoaddthree presented The Institute for the Art and Practice of Dissent at Home in greenroom, Manchester for emergency workshare. We will take this piece further!

The Institute for the Art and Practice of Dissent at Home forged links between Liverpool and Cardiff (one Culture of Capital to another). We advertised on Live Art list for a Live Art Opportunity, inviting interested parties to visit our Capitalism of Culture – we had a spare train ticket from Cardiff to Liverpool, on the day Riise headed in the wrong direction! Are we all doomed? Own goals, art exchanged for sport, culture for capitalism, home for activism?

Is Liverpool’s culture headed in the wrong direction?
Is Riise trying to tell us something?

Inspired by Unknown Poets and Papering over the Cracks
twoaddthree have visited a nearby derelict building and regenerated it with some poetry: Robert Frost’s Reluctance.

WINTER WARM-UP

One of our core events Institute Warming, the Institute’s first house party took place on Sunday 2nd March. 17 people attended. £173.22 was spent on extra cutlery, food and drinks. We served a Croatian speciality from Vegetina kuhinja Primosten Chicken dish and some crveni toc pasta for the vegetarians. Red wine and Cains’ Best Bitter – official slosh for Liverpool 08 Capitalism of Culture. All guests were given a tour of the house and introduced to the Institute and its residencies and activities.

The Institute got new filing cabinets, books shelves and a carpet – all provided by Freecycle – a web based community that encourages free exchange of unwanted goods. Thank you Becky and Sheila.

  A filing cabinet received from Sheila.

Lena and Sid, 7 months already, did a performance ‘Sid Jonah Anderson by Lena Simic’ in Carlisle on the 14th March as a part of MAP LIVE. This live art event staged the daily labour of mothering and critiqued the impossible expectations placed on the Mother. Whilst The Institute puts the critical within the home this performance takes the home out into the critical.

With the aim of putting capitalism back into culture we sent an email to Banksy with a request to increase the value of our council house property and do some good old fashioned regeneration work here at Bright Street in Everton. We suggested some Capitalism of Culture graffiti. We hope to see his very expensive artwork in our alleyway soon. We thought this might be a timely reminder that culturally led regeneration (aka Capital of Culture) is a dirty trick to bump up the prices of private property. We offered him the minimum wage £5.52 an hour. We’ll keep you posted on developments. A copy of the email is available in DOCUMENTS.

Website is up and running. Thank you to The Very Cooperative
£310 spent.

So far in the early days of February:
44 emails with messages of support and well wishes have been received.
1 gift accepted.
2 text messages.
2 post cards from UK and 2 letters from USA arrived. 1 post card on its way (all the way from New Zealand). Some might be lost at 19 Livingston Court, our previous address. The Institute for the Art and Practice of Dissent at Home now operates from 7 Bright Street in Everton, L6 1DL.

Pack-It-Up 08 took place during the last two weekends in January.
A total of 13 people joined in Pack-It-Up 08. £133.96 was spent on 27 hours of labour. Adults were paid minimum working rate of £5.52 per hour. Children were only given pocket money (in agreement with their parents/guardians – £1 per hour, with the maximum of £2). Average working shift was 2 hours, with only one person working for only 1 hour and one person persuaded us to work for 7 hours. One person worked 1 hour overtime, and was paid ‘double-time’ for it.

Each packer and labourer received a form to record their labour.

Gifts donated to the Institute in 2008

Oak Tree – thank you Julian Hughes
Travarica – thank you Branka Cvjeticanin
Constant Traveller book – thank you Tina Gverovic
Phone at Nine Just to Say You’re Alive book, poetry, short stories and postcards collections – thank you Linda Hart
Marx Angels by Pavel Büchler  – thank you Cathy Butterworth
Live Art Almanac – thank you Bryan Biggs
Perform a Moment of Freedom sign – thank you Janice Harding
Liverpool 08 mug, 14 Edgy Cities books – thank you Steve Higginson
Good Housekeeping chopping board  – thank you John Bennett
Kiosk DVD – thank you Vladislava Fekete
Fwords book – thank you Simon Murray
Miranda July book  – thank you Anna Francis
Miss Julie in Utopia original card – thank you Bryan Biggs
Salon Revolucije catalogue – thank you to Ivana Bago and Antonia Majaca
Molecular Revolution in Brazil by Félix Guattari & Suely Rolnik – thank you Nicola Kirkham
The Institutionale Clock– thank you Cathy Butterworth
Multimap set of espresso cups – thank you Pete Hindle
Artist Book – thank you Ulla Hvejsel
Why Societies Need Dissent book – thank you Ruth Beale

Postcards

Thank you to (in no particular order)

Michèle, Abi, Anna.
Reuben&Karin, Andy, Julija
James, Cathy and Chris
Branka, Linda and Mel & Andy
Rochele and Ruth
Janice, Helen and Sarah B
Rob and Dave

Emails

Over the first year the Institute received over 500 emails. We found out about interesting, weird and wonderful artists-led initiatives, individual artists and different arts spaces have been in touch. Here’s links to some that made us think, drink or chuckle:
www.meantime.org.uk
www.conwayandyoung.com
www.spartaction.com/csr.html
www.rationalrec.org.uk
www.aasgroup.net
www.sprawl.org.uk
www.imaginativeeye.co.uk
www.thelurkinghole.com
www.aotearoaserbiafriendshipsociety.net