Boîte-en-Valise Venice Biennale 2013 – Arts Pavilion Bournemouth
Arts Pavilion Bournemouth presented, during the preview week of the 55th International Art Exhibition, la Biennale di Venezia, Boîte-en-valise, a series of live art performances by established and emerging practitioners. Appropriating and transmuting Marcel Duchamp’s Boîte-en-valise and responding to Venice Biennale Art Director Massimiliano Gioni’s theme of The Encyclopedic Palace, each of the selected artists was invited to pack work in a suitcase and travel to Venice for presentation at [Palazzo Zenobio]. Stephanie James lead organiser and curator worked with Carol Maund, Arts Bournemouth and Mark Segal, Artists Agency.
The Boîte-en-valise 2015 project awarded a grant for the arts to support 9 artists on exhibition during the preview week of the 56th International Art Exhibition, la Biennale di Venezia. Working with two other curators, Mark Segal and Joanne Bushnell, Director of Aspex Gallery UK, and myself, the project included 3 artists based in NY USA, 3 artists based in the UK and 3 artists from Switzerland in dialogue across three venues; 2 in Venice and Aspex Gallery UK. The project was also funded by College of Visual and Performing Arts, Syracuse University, and the Arts Council Switzerland.
http://frameandreference.com/boite-en-valise-exchanges-through-performativity-and-practice/
Boîte-en-Valise: the generator Venice Biennale 2017
I collaborated with two curators from the UK on this project for the Venice Biennale, May 3rd – 13th.
Boîte-en-Valise aimed to encourage transportability of practice, the nurturing of collaboration and the cross-fertilisation of artistic practice.
This project focused on production, intended to be generative exploring the process of creating contemporary art, and sharing this with targeted audience groups in Portsmouth and Syracuse. Six artists from the UK and USA were invited to use a suitcase as their generator – to explore, explode, expand and then exhibit their practice.
The suitcase contained all that the artist needed to produce new work, working with materials transported within the suitcase or sourced from the environments in which they are resident. The normal sized suitcase was transported as luggage on a flight/train/bus journey and taken from the suitcase for production and/or presentation. Artists were invited to interpret this brief according to their practice.
For three days, the artists worked intensively with communities from in and around Portsmouth, UK, and then continue to develop/make their work with visitors to the exhibition/presentation in the international art hub of the Venice Biennale. Finally, the artists were invited to take the project to Syracuse University, providing an opportunity to reflect on the experience, while also enabling the further development of the work with targeted SU audiences. The artists worked closely with and were supported by curators: Mark Segal, Joanne Bushnell (Aspex, Portsmouth) and Stephanie James (Syracuse University, New York).
https://www.aspex.org.uk/whats-on/boite-en-valise/boite-en-valise-generator/
Curated Project: MEETING PLACE
2005–08 Meeting Place was a collaborative project between text+work, the Arts Institute at Bournemouth, and the Russell-Cotes Art Gallery and Museum in Bournemouth and was curated and managed by Stephanie James. Meeting Place provided a platform for 20 exhibiting artists and designers to respond to the unique and varied collections in the Russell-Cotes Museum. They were invited to commune with the artefacts, the spaces, and the cabinets, and respond to actual and imaginary events; personal and private, historical and present.
The exhibition was accompanied by a book which provided an account of some of the ways in which the artists have touched the raw nerves of the museum and catalogues each of the artist’s personal ‘narratives’ and ‘stories’.
This project was supported by Museums, Libraries and Archives Renaissance funding, AIB research and scholarship fund and an individual Grant for the Arts, Arts Council Southwest.
This project supported the development, marketing, audience development and presentation with a publication of an exhibition entitled Meeting Place, held at the Russell-Cotes Gallery and Museum (RC) and the text+work Gallery at the Arts Institute at Bournemouth (AIB), between September 2007 and March 2008.