At Home Media release
Extended to 17 July 2016 Bothy Gallery
Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) presents At Home, the first in a series of exhibitions Images, left to right curated from the Arts Council Collection as part of the National Partners programme marking the Collection’s 70th anniversary. The exhibition highlights Arts Council Collection Damien Hirst, Relationships, works of domestic scale within the Bothy Gallery and comprises pieces by artists including 1991. Arts Council Collection, Yoko Ono, Joseph Beuys, Damien Hirst, Gary Hume, Sophie Calle, Fiona Banner, Arman, Southbank Centre, London Dan Graham, Paul Rooney, Roy Lichtenstein, Barbara Hepworth, Jordan Baseman, Robert © Damien Hirst and Science Filliou, Bill Brandt, Jenny Holzer and Mark Wallinger. Ltd. All rights reserved, DACS 2016 At Home relaunches the Bothy Gallery following its refurbishment, supported by Arts
Council England and a significant public giving campaign. Once the home of the Head Sophie Calle, The Tie, 1993. Gardener, the Bothy Gallery is a historic part of the Bretton Estate and was built around Arts Council Collection, 1810. The exhibition references the gallery as former dwelling, but also the sense of YSP as Southbank Centre, London a sanctuary for many and our continued work with hard-to-reach communities, including © the artist. those who have made the region their home whether by choice or forced migration. Through the familiar threads of home and domestic objects, the exhibition shares over 40 works from 1937 to 2004 and reveals the shift in art over that period from the representational, such as Flowers Against Chintz (1956) by the Bloomsbury Group artist Duncan Grant, through to the powerful social commentary photography of Bill Brandt, to conceptual art and the appropriation of ‘ready-made’ objects as pioneered by Marcel Duchamp, evident in works such as My Glasses (1994) by Jonathan Monk. Intuition... Instead of a Cookbook (1968) by Joseph Beuys, recognised as one of the most important artists of the last century, reflects his profound philosophy that art could affect social change and that the simple act of cooking a meal could itself be considered an artistic process. The transformation of the everyday into the extraordinary through such process informs Darren Lago’s work based on a hairdryer, This is Not a Pipe (1996), in a knowing and playful reference to René Magritte’s famous painting Ceci n’est pas une pipe (1929) and its message that the artwork was canvas and paint, not the thing it represented. The tendency to overlay objects with meaning is further explored in Sophie Calle’s The Tie (1993) which is emblazoned with a poetic text about a man she met and the tie he wore. The exhibition offers the first opportunity to experience Flat 23 (2002) by Paul Rooney, a three-part film and sound work in which the former resident of a soon-to-be demolished flat lists the objects that used to be in her home. This relates to Seizure (2008/2013) by Roger Hiorns, an extraordinary crystal-covered flat first created in a condemned property in Elephant and Castle, removed and preserved by the Arts Council Collection. Seizure is on long-term loan to YSP where it is presented within an award-winning concrete structure, commissioned from Adam Khan Architects, near the Bothy Garden. Ends
NOTES TO EDITORS ABOUT THE ARTS COUNCIL COLLECTION’S 70TH ANNIVERSARY The Arts Council Collection, the UK’s most widely seen collection of modern and contemporary art, is celebrating its 70th anniversary during 2016. The celebrations include 8 new commissions that will go on display across the UK throughout 2016; two new touring exhibitions, Night in the Museum, curated by Ryan Gander, and Drawn from Life: People on Paper; and the National Partners programme, which will deepen the Collection’s longstanding relationship with key museums and galleries around the country and enable many more people to visit Collection exhibitions. The National Partners are the Towner Art Gallery, Eastbourne, Birmingham Museums Trust and The Walker Art Gallery, National Museums Liverpool alongside YSP. The programme will see 24 exhibitions over three years. More information about the Arts Council Collection’s 70th anniversary celebrations can be found at artscouncilcollection.org.uk.
ABOUT THE ARTS COUNCIL COLLECTION In a challenging economic landscape, the Arts Council Collection provides important artistic support to England’s gallery infrastructure, through its extensive loans programme, touring exhibitions and Select, a programme that invites galleries and museums to select exhibitions and displays from the Collection. It also provides curatorial support to a wide range of galleries and museums. With nearly 8,000 works by over 2,000 artists, the National Partners fund will enable works from the Collection to be seen in new, imaginative displays, whilst celebrating England’s world class galleries. More about the National Partners Fund can be found online: http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/media/uploads/ Guidance-for-applicants_ACC_National-partners-fund.pdf The Arts Council Collection began when the Arts Council of Great Britain was founded in 1946. It took over a small group of paintings from the Council for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts (CEMA) and its aim was to promote and encourage the appreciation of contemporary art through touring exhibitions. The Collection has continued to grow, acquiring innovative works each year and includes paintings, sculptures, original works on paper, prints, photographs, film and video and installation works. The Collection includes important, often early, work by many of the most influential British artists from the mid-twentieth century to the present day, including Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth, Ben Nicholson, Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud, Victor Pasmore, David Hockney, Bridget Riley, Patrick Caulfield, Gilbert & George, Richard Hamilton, Richard Deacon, Antony Gormley, Mark Wallinger, Peter Doig, Damien Hirst, Rachel Whiteread, Chris Ofili, Steve McQueen, Mona Hatoum, Tracey Emin, Sarah Lucas, Grayson Perry, Glenn Brown, Jeremy Deller, Keith Coventry, Roger Hiorns and Wolfgang Tillmans.
Since 1986 the Arts Council Collection has been managed by Southbank Centre, on behalf of Arts Council England. It is now based at Southbank Centre, London and at our Sculpture Centre at Longside in Yorkshire Sculpture Park. The centre at Longside enables the Arts Council Collection team to extend its sculpture conservation and research programmes and to increase public access to the sculpture collection through increased lending and exhibition initiatives. A diverse and stimulating range of exhibitions from the Collection, including displays of some of the most recent acquisitions, can be seen in the adjacent Longside Gallery, a unique space used on an alternating basis by the Arts Council Collection and Yorkshire Sculpture Park. artscouncilcollection.org.uk
The Arts Council Collection in numbers –The Collection was formed in 1946 and currently consists of nearly 8,000 works by over 2,000 artists –The Collection currently has over 550 works on long term loan to universities (including their libraries), medical research centres and charitable organisations throughout the UK –Since 2012, 3,905 loans have been made to 327 venues representing 50% of the Collection –Since 2005, 7,984 loans have been on public display
ABOUT ARTS COUNCIL ENGLAND Arts Council England champions, develops and invests in artistic and cultural experiences that enrich people’s lives. We support a range of activities across the arts, museums and libraries – from theatre to digital art, reading to dance, music to literature, and crafts to collections. Great art and culture inspires us, brings us together and teaches us about ourselves and the world around us. In short, it makes life better. Between 2015 and 2018, we plan to invest £1.1 billion of public money from government and an estimated £700 million from the National Lottery to help create these experiences for as many people as possible across the country. artscouncil.org.uk
ABOUT YORKSHIRE SCULPTURE PARK PRESS ENQUIRIES: Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) is the leading international centre for modern and Abigail Varian, SUTTON contemporary sculpture. It is an independent charitable trust and registered museum +44 (0)20 7183 3577 (number 1067908) situated in the 500-acre, 18th-century Bretton Hall estate in West [email protected] Yorkshire. Founded in 1977 by Executive Director Peter Murray, YSP was the first sculpture park in the UK, and is the largest of its kind in Europe, providing the only place in Kerry Chase, YSP Europe to see Barbara Hepworth’s The Family of Man in its entirety alongside a significant +44 (0)1924 832515 collection of sculpture, including bronzes by Henry Moore, and site-specific works by Andy [email protected] Goldsworthy, David Nash and James Turrell. YSP also mounts a world-class, year-round temporary exhibitions programme including some of the world’s leading artists across five Download images at indoor galleries and the open air. Recent highlights include exhibitions by KAWS, Bill Viola, ysp.co.uk/AtHomePress Anthony Caro, Fiona Banner, Ai Weiwei, Ursula von Rydingsvard, Amar Kanwar, Yinka Shonibare MBE, Joan Miró and Jaume Plensa. More than 80 works on display across the Follow @YSPsculpture estate include major sculptures by Ai Weiwei, Roger Hiorns, Sol LeWitt, Joan Miró, Dennis #AtHome Oppenheim and Magdalena Abakanowicz. YSP’s core work is made possible by investment from Arts Council England, Wakefield Council, Liz and Terry Bramall Foundation and Sakurako and William Fisher through the Sakana Foundation. YSP was named Art Fund Museum of the Year in 2014. ysp.co.uk