Category Archives: 2006

MAKE EVERYTHING NEW
Book Works

This was a collection of texts and artists projects, examining the possibility of a communist informed contemporary art practice

The book: published in an edition of 1,500 copies by Book Works, London, UK and Project Arts Centre, Dublin, UK, 2006; 240 x 170mm; 176pp, thread sewn; 4-colour images throughout; paperback cover

Accompanying 2-colour poster edition, incorporating extract from the text: 710 x 538mm

Context from the Book Works catalogue: ‘Communism is routinely defined as defeated and its conquest the subject of regular celebration. Caught in the disappointment and negative connotations of the past, it has become all but unthinkable. Make Everything New – A Project On Communism seeks to rescue the idea of Communism from this trap. Collaborating with artists, writers and collectives, this project has commissioned and collected counter-narratives, abstract and unrealistic ideas, engaged political commentary and satirical work, that presents neither an historical or comprehensive overview nor a requiem for the past. It is a collection of partial and subjective accounts of various creative practices, an experimental platform for ideas and an attempt to see in what ways the communist imagination can be materialised as art.’

LITTLE PRIVATE GOVERNMENTS
Amanda Beech & Matthew Poole

SecMoCo were flattered to be approached by this grouping of cutting-edge contemporary theorists/artists to devise an identity relavent to the ideas informing their exhibition, catalogue and symposium Little Private Governments which examined the relationship of art to organizational systems and power (University Gallery Essex, 01 February 2006).

First published by University of the West of England, 2006; edited, and with a foreword by, Amanda Beech & Matthew Poole; texts by Suhail Malik and Roman Vasseur; 210 x 148 mm; 48 pp; 20 color images; softcover with 4-colour cover.

Accompanying 4-colour poster edition, incorporating design for the catalogue cover: 420 x 297mm.

Context, from the exhibition and symposium publicity:
Little Private Governments brings together emerging and established artists whose work demonstrates a long-term interest in the rhetoric of freedom and democracy. The exhibition includes works by Amanda Beech, Pil & Galia Kollectiv, Jenny Holzer, Martin Kippenberger, Jake and Dinos Chapman and Roman Vasseur. The accompanying catalogue includes commisioned new writing from three authors covering current debates on aesthetics and politics: a collaborative essay by Beech and Poole, and essays by Dr Suhail Malik and Roman Vasseur.

Jointly curated by Matthew Poole and Amanda Beech ‘Little Private Governments’ addresses the place of art within the structures of capitalism, democracy and idealism.

Links:
www.romanvasseur.com