The Playground: Magazines and Books as Sites for Art conference will consist of three two-hour sessions. The first session will introduce the theme of books and magazines as sites for art. Examples such as Le Livre by Stéphane Mallarmé and Phyllis Johnson's Aspen magazine, which ran between 1965 and 1971, will be discussed. The latter magazine was published in the form of boxes containing film and sound recordings, texts and limited edition works, which expanded the magazine format and engaged audiences with interactive material.
The second session’s main theme is the alternative Polish artistic scene of the ‘70s. The starting point for this is Concept Art, a catalogue and exhibition developed by Jerzy Ludwiński in 1970, in collaboration with Natalia LL and Andrzej Lachowicz. The analysis will also concern the Art Worker's Notebook and the publications of the Film Form Studio. These magazines were all created outside the official network of production and distribution and circulated from hand to hand or by mail in order to avoid censorship.
The third session's speakers will discuss independent publishing practices in the context of the artistic magazines of the '80s produced after the introduction of martial law. In these times of censorship, access to artistic materials, even paper, was extremely limited. Dominik Kuryłek from the National Museum in Kraków, Michal Woliński (piktogram / BLA) and Nick Thurston (Information as Material) will take part in this part of the conference.
Magazines - the good, the bad, and the kinky: read all about the new wave of art publications in Poland.
The conference was organized with the support of the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, the Adam Mickiewicz Institute, the Polish Cultural Institute in London and the British Council.
Along with the conference, the exhibition Aspen Magazine 1965 – 1971 will run from 23rd May until 1st September. It is intended to evoke the original concepts of interdisciplinarity and collective reading, which the magazine was designed around, by unpacking the films and sound recordings from the boxes and giving visitors access to the ten original issues of the magazine. This exhibition is the first project at MWW realized in collaboration with the Whitechapel Gallery in London.
Agnieszka Sural writes about the novel as the form of art
Aspen Magazine: 1965 – 1974 Exhibition
Wrocław Contemporary Museum
Duration: 23 May – 1 Sep. 2014
Curators: Sylwia Serafinowicz (Wrocław Contemporary Museum), Nayia Yiakoumaki (Whitechapel Gallery)
Source: muzeumwspolczesne.pl, culture.pl, ed. AS, 19.05.2014, translated: Katarzyna Maksimiuk, 20.05.2014