Brutalism Redux

Friday 27 January 2017 from 4pm, Dana Centre, The Science Museum

Brutalism Redux: Resuscitating the urban politics of brutalist architecture

Organised by Oli Mould, Royal Holloway University of London, Centre for the GeoHumanities.

This event brings together academics, artists and campaigners working on brutalism to discuss whether there is space for a brutalist politics, as well as brutalist style in our contemporary cities. The panelists are:

Jessie Brennan (Artist and author of ‘Regeneration!’)
Chris Beanland (Writer, author of ‘Concrete Concept’)
Catherine Croft (Director of the Twentieth Century Society)
Oliver Carpenter (Associate Curator of Infrastructure and Built Environment, Science Museum)
Oli Mould (Lecturer in Human Geography, Royal Holloway, University of London)

Free tickets for panel discussion.

It will be followed by a drinks reception, where some of the art work of the panellists will be on display, and a keynote lecture by Professor Christoph Lindner of the University of Oregon, entitled “Brutalism in Ruins”.  

Free tickets for keynote lecture.

LOCATION: Science Museum Dana Research Centre & Library, 165 Queens Gate, London SW7 5HD

A5 x n

dalla Rosa Gallery

Jessie Brennan 'Ashtray' from Inside The Green Backyard (Opportunity Area), (2015-16)

27 January - 18 February 2017
Preview Thursday 26 January, 6.30 - 8.30 pm

A group exhibition of A5 size works by artists associated with dalla Rosa.

dalla Rosa Gallery
3 Leighton Place (Ground Floor)
London NW5 2QL

Drawing Matter

Drawing of the Week, 4 January 2017

A Fall of Ordinariness and Light (2014) is Drawing Matter's 'drawing of the week', with writing by Olivia Horsfall-Turner.

DRAWING FUTURES

THE BARTLETT, UCL

11 - 12 November 2016

Jessie Brennan is a selected contributor to Drawing Futures conference and publication.

Drawing Futures is a new international peer-reviewed conference and publication on speculative drawing for art and architecture, founded by the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London. Chaired by Professor Frédéric Migayrou, Laura Allen and Luke Pearson, the inaugural Drawing Futures Conference will be held on 11-12 November 2016 at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London.  

Keynote speakers: Pablo Bronstein, Neil Spiller, Hsinming Fung, and Madelon Vriesendorp.

Tickets

Re:development: Voices, Cyanotypes & Writings from The Green Backyard

Book Launch: AA Bookshop, London

Wednesday 26 OCTOBER 2016, 6:30-8:30pm

Re: development brings together voices, cyanotypes and writings from The Green Backyard, a ‘community growing project’ in Peterborough threatened with a proposed development. The book, a culmination of the artist's year-long residency hosted by arts organisation Metal, brings together artwork and 10 essay contributions exploring the politics of land use and value. It is an attempt to explore in The Green Backyard one of Britain’s most contested territories: land ownership, and its radical political shift from communal to private. 

Contributing authors include: Sophie Antonelli (activist; co-founder of The Green Backyard); Dr. Alexandre Apsan Frediani (researcher of development practice; Lecturer at the Bartlett Development Planning Unit, UCL); Dr. Robert Biel (carpenter-historian; Senior Lecturer at the Bartlett Development Planning Unit, UCL); Dougald Hine (writer and social thinker; co-founder of Dark Mountain); Prof. Jane Holder (Professor of Environmental Law, UCL); Anna Minton (writer; Co-Director of UEL’s MRes course, Reading the Neoliberal City); Dr. Barbara Penner (architectural historian; Senior Lecturer at the Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL); Prof. Jane Rendell (artist-writer; Professor of Architecture and Art, and Director of History and Theory at the Bartlett School of Architecture); Prof. Ben Rogaly (geographer; Professor of Geography, University of Sussex); and Dr. Maria Walsh (writer and art critic; Reader in Artists’ Moving Image at Chelsea College of Arts, University of the Arts London).

Re: development is available from bookshops, and order online:

AA Bookshop 

RIBA Bookshop

The Photographers' Gallery

Camden Arts Centre

Tate Modern

Whitechapel Gallery

South London Gallery

dalla Rosa Gallery

Press, reviews and mentions of Re: development and related project:

Guardian Cities 

Ken Worpole 

Chris Fite-Wassilak 

Guardian

Engaging with Change: Contemporary Art Practice and Regeneration →

Made in Thamesmead

One Eye Closed onto the World

16 – 18 September 2016, 10 am - 4 pm

Celebrate and explore Thamesmead's unique character in a weekend of extraordinary events produced in collaboration with the local community and some of London’s best artists and creative organisations.

Flat 42 Coralline Walk, Thamesmead SE2 9ST

One Eye Closed onto the World
George Charman and Jessie Brennan present installations in a vacant flat. Charman will transform a room into a camera obscura projecting the view outside onto the interior walls. Brennan begins a long-term project that seeks to engage residents in their experiences of life in the area and presents new work, including graphite rubbings of doormats. 

For a full list of events taking place across the weekend, please see here.

Forgotten Estates →

Royal Academy of Arts

Jessie Brennan Robin Hood Gardens (view from Naval Row), 2014

Talk

Monday 26 September 2016
6.30 — 8pm, The Royal Institution, 21 Albemarle Street, London W1S 4BS

Speakers debate how Britain’s post-war housing estates have become a battleground of differing political and architectural ideologies.

Speakers include: 

Jessie Brennan – Artist; author of Regeneration! Conversations, Drawings, Archives & Photographs from Robin Hood Gardens (2015)

Mark Crinson – Professor of Architectural History, Birkbeck, University of London

Owen Hopkins – Architecture Programme Curator, Royal Academy (chair)

Kate Macintosh – Architect, formerly of the London Boroughs of Southwark and Lambeth, and East Sussex and Hampshire County Councils; designer of Dawson’s Heights, East Dulwich (1964–72)

Dr Paul Watt – Reader in Urban Studies, Birkbeck, University of London

RESIDENT →

Metal Peterborough

If This Were to Be Lost

The Green Backyard, Peterborough

If This Were to Be Lost (2016), Installation (painted birch plywood on scaffold), 1.9 x 19 m. Situated at The Green Backyard, Peterborough.

9 JULY 2016 - 1 JULY 2017

Jessie Brennan has created a new, site-specific artwork for The Green Backyard (GBY). If This Were to Be Lost (2016) takes the form of a temporary, large-scale, sculptural installation (painted birch plywood on scaffold) in the garden. The phrase is adapted from an oral recording by a contributor to Inside The Green Backyard (Opportunity Area) – an outcome of the artist’s residency. If This Were to Be Lost raises many questions about what this community (and many others engaged in voluntary-run, urban green spaces) stands to lose if the land were to be lost to a proposed redevelopment.

This artwork is concurrent with RESIDENT, a Metal curated exhibition by Marc Atkinson, Jessie Brennan and Matt Lewis at Peterborough City Gallery & Museum, running until 28 August 2016. 

Read about the project in the Guardian. Look out for the artwork from the East Coast mainline train (travelling from Edinburgh to London), and share using the hashtag: #IfThisWeretoBeLost

Re: development, a book authored by the artist about The Green Backyard, is published in 2016. 

Summer Exhibition 2016 →

Royal Academy of Arts

13 June – 21 August 2016

Jessie Brennan’s The Order Land and The Justification have been selected for the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition 2016, coordinated by the leading British sculptor Richard Wilson RA. The hanging committee for the Summer Exhibition includes Royal Academicians Stephen Chambers, Louisa Hutton, Bill Jacklin, Jock McFadyen, David Mach, Cathie Pilkington, David Remfry, Ian Ritchie and Bill Woodrow.

KALEID 2016 →

Oslo

Regeneration! Conversations, Drawings, Archives & Photographs from Robin Hood Gardens

Jessie Brennan's book Regeneration! (Silent Grid, 2015) is selected for KALEID 2016.

20 - 23 May 2016 | Offprint London | Tate Modern | UK

Offprint Projects is a traveling art publishing fair featuring discerning projects across a wide range of media. The fair includes books, zines, vinyls, posters, prints, websites, magazines, and blogs from over 140 participants in the fields of contemporary art, graphic design, literature, poetry, philosophy, and experimental music.

11 - 13 May 2016 | Kunsthøgskolen i Oslo | Norway

On Thursday 12th May join KALEID editions and special guests for a one day seminar at Kunsthøgskolen i Oslo, Norway’s leading National Academy for the Arts. An exhibition to accompany the seminar will showcase this years selection of artists’ books between 11-13 May 2016.

Entrance to the fair, seminar and exhibition is free to the public.

Further information about KALEID and selected artists here.

REGENERATION: WHOM IS IT FOR? →

JOHN RUSKIN PRIZE

A Fall of Ordinariness and Light (The Order Land), 2014

Thursday 19 May, 7.30 - 9.30pm

Artists' talk & open floor discussion with Jessie Brennan & Hilary Powell

Part of The 3rd John Ruskin Prize Programme - Recording Britain Now: Society

Doors open at 6.30pm for exhibition viewing + introduction

Tickets £5 | Concessions Free | Includes screening of Legend: A-Z of The Lea Valley by Hilary Powell.  

The Electrician’s Shop Gallery | Trinity Buoy Wharf, London | E14 0JY

More information and booking here.

THE 3RD JOHN RUSKIN PRIZE - RECORDING BRITAIN NOW: SOCIETY →

THE BIG DRAW

A Fall of Ordinariness and Light (The Justification), 2014

6 - 21 MAY 2016

Preview and Editions Launch: Thursday 5 May, 6-9pm

The 3rd John Ruskin Prize - Recording Britain Now: Society

The Electrician’s Shop Gallery | Trinity Buoy Wharf, London | E14 0JY

See here for information about how to get there and Editions.

Drawn →

University College Hospital

Jessie Brennan Medway, 2013 (detail)

29 April — 1 July 2016

Private View: Thursday 28th April 2016, 6.00pm—7.30pm 

An exhibition celebrating the art of drawing with works from: 

Jessie Brennan | Ian Chamberlain | Simon Faithfull | Nina Fowler | Ann-Marie James | Olivia Kemp | Whitney McVeigh | David M Price | Frances Richardson 

The Street Gallery, University College Hospital, 235 Euston Road, London NW1 2BU

RSVP for PV: guy.noble@uclh.nhs.uk | 020 3447 5451

Second Prize: John Ruskin Prize 2015 →

The New Art Gallery Walsall

Jessie Brennan A Fall of Ordinariness and Light (2014), John Ruskin Prize, The New Art Gallery Walsall

Jessie Brennan's A Fall of Ordinariness and Light (2014) has won Second Prize in the John Ruskin Prize 2015. 

The exhibition at The New Art Gallery Walsall continues until 17 April 2016, followed by a London showing at The Electrician’s Shop Gallery, Trinity Buoy Wharf, from 6 - 22 May 2016. 

SELECTION PANEL: Adam Dant (Artist), Gill Saunders (Senior Curator of Prints,V&A Museum) , Stephen Snoddy (Director, The New Art Gallery Walsall), Sue Grayson Ford (Big Draw President), Clive Wilmer (Master, The Guild of St.George)

Aesthetica Art Prize

Aesthetica Art Prize Exhibition 2016

14 April – 29 May 2016

Jessie Brennan's A Fall of Ordinariness and Light (2014) has been longlisted for the prize. Full details and press release here.

Aesthetica Art Prize Exhibition, York St Mary’s, Castlegate, York, YO1 9RN

Art Lending Library →

Metal Peterborough

5 - 24 March 2016

Metal is delighted to welcome The Art Lending Library to Peterborough, on its last and only Southern stop in its tour of the UK. Art Lending Library is a project by Market Gallery and Walker & Bromwich. Its is an evolving social sculpture housing a diverse collection of artworks that can be enjoyed in your own home.

The Art Lending Library is an ambitious commission by Zoë Walker and Neil Bromwich which takes the form of an experimental library and public procession. Originally conceived and curated by Market Gallery for Glasgow International Festival of Visual Art 2012, it provides the unique opportunity for the people of the town or city in which it is exhibited to borrow works of art and enjoy them within their homes, work places and community centres.

The Art Lending Library brings together over 50 works by a diverse range of artists working across the broad spectrum of formats available within contemporary visual arts practice. The project has been made possible through the generosity of participating artists in gifting their works into the care of the library, to be made available to loan for the duration of the exhibition.

The Art Lending Library will be exhibited at Metal Culture, Chauffeurs Cottage, St Peters Rd, Peterborough, PE1 1YX from Saturday 5th until Sunday 24th March 2016.

Concrete Matters →

The CASS & Bank Space Gallery

Jessie Brennan A Fall of Ordinariness and Light (The Scheme), 2014

3 - 19 March 2016

First year students of the MA Curating the Contemporary from the London Metropolitan University and Whitechapel Gallery joint programme will hold their first exhibition, Concrete Matters, at the Bank Space Gallery from 4 March through 19 March.

Employing the concept of ‘psychogeography,’ Concrete Matters delves into the bond existing between the human mind and its surrounding environment. The exhibition explores the mutually shaping processes of urban space and human identity through photography, mixed media, sculpture, performance, and sitespecific works. Connected by a shared interest in the reflexivity of society and urban structures, the group exhibition consists of ten national and international artists: Victoria Adam, Jessie Brennan, Anna Fafaliou, Şakir Gökçebağ, Lucy Joyce, Georgia Metaxas, Nina Pappa, Emma Papworth, Nikolas Ventourakis and Ben Woodeson.

Complementing the exhibition is a public programme of talks and performances bringing together varying perspectives on issues raised in the show. This will include performances by Lee Fraser and Lolo Hjtyu Tuyuyu, as well as an interactive installation by George Kostoglou and talk by Simon Banos. Curators’ tours will also take place throughout the course of the two weeks.